My Personal N=1

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I have been having a really weird week. I had a session with my Hawaiian healer Monday that made some breakthroughs that I think are very positive in the end but are not easy to go through.

My torso is a compilation of scar tissue on top of scar tissue. Two unsuccessful attempts at lump-ectomy to get rid of breast cancer 8 years ago, followed by the full monty mastectomy, then the reconstructive surgery. Mine was a transplant of tummy tissue up to my chest leaving yet another scar across my tummy where I already had one from a hysterectomy decades back. Then there were two places in the reconstructive surgery where things didn't heal up right, one on the tummy incision and one up under my arm. In both of those places they had to open things up again and hose it all out and re-close it. Then there was the nipping and tucking that was done on the side that didn't have the cancer in order to attain something resembling symmetry.

So, lots of scar tissue.
The lump of fat and muscle that was transplanted up to fill in my chest had become completely rigid and solid, hanging on to my ribs by layers and layers of fascia. None of the normal bounce or wiggle that tissue should have.

When my healer was working on my armpit area on Monday, things suddenly started loosening up. All of a sudden, I had nerve sensations where there had been only numbness for 8 years. It's like the nerves found new pathways to connect. This is awesome but a little overwhelming. It was almost like the sensations were TOO intense TOO fast. I was in quite a bit of pain for the rest of Monday and into Tuesday.

The pain has subsided now and, when I look in the mirror, there is finally symmetry. Both sides are at the same height and size and move the same. It is still really weird to be able to FEEL the inside of a shirt in that particular place again. I'm still getting used to it.

For the first time in eight years, I really feel like I have two breasts as opposed to one real breast and one lumpy fascia snarl stuck to my ribs.
 
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Maybe analogous to the pins and needles you get when your foot's asleep and wakes up. Glad to hear that the pain receded and you're feeling better.
 
Yes, there was some of that tingly feeling but it felt like it was running down my arm and out the ends of my fingers like it was dashing for the exits after having been trapped for too long.

That went on the whole rest of the day after the appointment. The next day I saw my healer at the coffee house and he noticed that my hand was shaking when I tried to hold a cup. He did some work on just that arm and managed to straighten that out.

All of this has to be seen in the context of me being the ultimate sceptic about anything resembling "energy work" , Reiki and such. Always thought that was complete woo. Not so sure now.

If my dog can sense seizures, perhaps it is possible that some extremely sensitive and well trained individuals can sense "energy flow" in another person.

In addition to all the tingly stuff though there was a lot of deep tissue soreness like a bruise from being kicked in the chest by a horse.
 
This past weekend was the biggest deal weekend of the whole year for Molokai, bigger than anything like Memorial Day. It was the annual Hula Festival.
According to Hawaiian legends, the hula dance originated here on Molokai. All the other islands acknowledge this too; we're not just making it up to have a tourist event.
So the festival goes for four days with historical lectures, hula lessons, hula demonstrations, and then the big open air festival on Saturday with all the local craftspeople selling their stuff and food booths, face painting, etc. Plus lots of music and hula "teams" representing the best from all of the Hawaiian islands showing off their stuff.

One of the fair booths was my Hawaiian healer and an elderly lady to whom he introduced me saying that she was his "kumu" or teacher, the one he learned the art from, "Auntie Snookie" to her friends a tiny but stout lady with short white hair on her head and long curly white hairs on her chinny chin chin.
Well, Auntie took one look at me at told me to sit down. No discussion about it. When Auntie tells you to sit down, you sit down.
I had been having all those weird sensations I was writing about before all week plus getting headaches every evening right about sunset but just behind my right eye (which is also the side where he had been doing the work to loosen up my surgical scars).

My healer plus Auntie went to work on me with him doing the physical manipulations and her doing what can only be described as the Hawaiian version of "laying on of hands" along with some lovely chanting in the Hawaiian language.

It was mind blowing. I'm sure (in my logical, scientific rational brain) that there is probably a large component of placebo involved but I really don't care. I was sitting there in full view of anyone who strolled by with tears streaming down my face. Auntie handed me a hankie and kept chanting.

I went home that evening and was out like a light by 9pm and slept for 12 straight hours until 9am. Then last night I slept for another 10 straight hours. I feel so beautifully well rested. Real restorative sleep. Ahhhhhhh......

The only way I can describe it is that the patterns of tension and tightness that had been shaken loose in my session earlier this week were still there somehow kicking around inside me and looking for a way out. Auntie showed them the exits. No more headaches since.

She explained it too me that every time the body experiences a physical pain there is also an emotional pain as well. Losing a breast to cancer is not just about the pain, scars, mobility issues, pills, etc. It is also about fear, anger, hopelessness and helplessness. Until you learn to let go of the emotional pain, the body will hang on to the memory of the physical pain.

I think more attention needs to be paid to the emotional component of healing in western medicine.
 
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I am so very glad that you are finding yourself in all this. It is because you are so brave and you CLEARLY mean business and Auntie and your healer know what they know and they ALSO mean business. I don't understand how we westerners keep to our strange notion that you can really know a living creature by studying it as if it is not living. So strange. How could it be that what is physical is not emotional and how could it be that there could be emotion without some body? So is it true that this body is only a place where "the universe makes a knot in itself, short-lived, complex structures of proteins that have to complicate themselves more and more in order to survive, until everything breaks and turns simple once again, the knot dissolved, the riddle gone?" Many thoughts in your direction!
 
Thank you Bidwell.

That's a poignant quote. Who said that or is that a Bidwell original?

It's a wonderful process even while being a bit scary. Who wants to re-experience all that stuff that has been so expertly stuffed down there for so long? But the letting go feels wonderful. There has to be that synergy between the physical and emotional openness to make it work right, though.


The way Auntie put the challenge of my life to me is this. "YOU have to find a way to speak YOUR truth."
 
Hey MAB!

My jasmine essential oil showed up today so I'm going to give that a try. It smells heavenly.
 
Sounds like Auntie appeared at the right moment! That quote is from Lars Gustafson, a Swedish poet, translated by Yvonne Sandstorm. It is from a poem I cut out of the New Yorker in the late 1980s named Elegy for a dead Laborador. Aloha Bird! I am 95% certain you would love this poem which is very long. I am hoping you can find it on the internet. My mental abilities are caput other than in the verbal department so if you can't find it, let me know and I will gladly, gladly copy it out as a forum message. As far as the internet goes, my my brain is [hopefully temporarily] cooked [other than the part that verbalizes].
 
This paper has three stanzas of that poem in it ( and the rest is interesting as well).

http://www.inspiteofitall.se/news/a-dog´s-life:-to-be-together-in-different-worlds1/

The full text is evidently locked up in the New Yorker archives and they won't let you at it without a subscription. But yes, I'm sure I would like the poem and the poet.


Caput and cooked don't sound so good. I hope you have better days coming up soon.
 
:adore: :adore: :adore: :adore: :adore: :adore:


I sometimes think Nak has a special direct line to the Gods of Google.
 
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This is where my dog and I go hiking several times a week:

https://search.yahoo.com/yhs/search...t=att&hsimp=yhs-att_001&type=att_pc_my_portal

https://search.yahoo.com/yhs/search...t=att&hsimp=yhs-att_001&type=att_pc_my_portal

The highway goes from my house and ends at a State Park parking lot about 1.8 miles away on the central northern coast of Molokai. From the parking lot there are two trails, one to the Kalaupapa overlook and the other to the Phallic Rock. So with those two trails plus the highway walking it is probably a bit more than 4 miles round trip and involves some pretty good hills. Plus I let my dog chase the occasional mongoose for some sprints.
 
Thanks for sending the clips. I think you and doggo are going to live forever, what with these four mile strolls in paradise and all the rest of your doings. It is a remarkable part of the world to be right outside your door and ready to be walked every day or so -- and I get the sense that the wind must be blowing gently up there! How nice.
 
Bidwell said:
Thanks for sending the clips. I think you and doggo are going to live forever, what with these four mile strolls in paradise and all the rest of your doings. It is a remarkable part of the world to be right outside your door and ready to be walked every day or so -- and I get the sense that the wind must be blowing gently up there! How nice.
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Oh yes, it is breezy up here most of the time. When you get to the cliff overlook you are facing directly out into the tradewinds. I didn't realize how polluted and stale city air smells until I got used to this fresh air.

Dignan said:
Makes me want to hit the water..
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Something I keep meaning to do more of. I can see the ocean on three sides of my porch view but I don't actually get in it as often as I would like.
 
Nakamova said:
I used to date a guy who had property where you could gather oysters and mussels off the beach when the tide was out. Raw oysters with martinis and then steamed mussels for dinner. And fresh sea asparagus too (I think you may have that where you are). That was heaven...
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I found someone at the farmer's market that sells sea asparagus. I remembered you posting this several pages back and went ahead and bought some. So yummy. I sauteed some sea asparagus in ghee until the ghee turned light green then took the asparagus out and used the ghee to cook some mahi mahi. The asparagus has a delightfully salty taste (like the ocean air smells) and that went beautifully with seafood.
 
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