Pain has a voice. That’s what I’ve learned. Or rather my body has a voice, many voices and pain is one of them.
Carpal tunnel syndrome squeezes the space in the wrist where the nerves and blood vessels pass thru into the hand. It can cause numbness, tingling, muscle weakness and pain - especially at night.
One night I was lying in bed with my hand brace on feeling the pain traveling all over my hand. Sometimes it felt like my palm was on fire, like I had stuck my hand in a pizza oven. Sometimes the pain was in my fingers, and then it would move to the base of my thumb, then to my wrist. I would try to talk to it, try to understand what it was saying as if each location was a voice and each voice had a meaning, a message.
It moved from the tip of my thumb to the middle of my fingers and then to my elbow. It would disappear for a few moments and then come back in another location. What was it doing? What was it trying to say? I could only guess by feeling it and breathing into it. That buzzing feeling that seemed to be decreasing in frequency and intensity? I could only hope and pray that it was the inflammation leaving my body. I spent most of that night feeling all that and trying to find the most comfortable position for my hand propped up on the pillow next to my bed.
Carpal tunnel syndrome is a fairly intense, persistent pain. It has a lot to say and I spent several nights lying in bed, practicing meditation and talking to it. A friend of mine pointed out that physical pain can also have an emotional component. I watched the video he sent me. Dr. Sorno. It seemed like his ideas might have some applicability so I endeavored to catalogue all the emotional pain I have accumulated in my life. There was a lot. I have carried it around for years like a burden, unwilling or unable to let go of it. It had became so much a part of me, so familiar, that I didn’t know how to get rid of it. The pain, however, (and Dr. Sorno’s video) was telling me that I needed to try.
I did try and amazingly the pain went away. It came back later but it seemed like something had changed. Yeah, something had changed alright - I no longer wanted to carry around all those regrets, all those feelings of being abandoned, rejected and disinherited. I wanted to be free and clear and it was worth all the pain I had been experiencing if I could get there. I had quite a dynamic conversation with my emotional body, felt the power of being in conversation with it and felt elated when I realized I could let go of all that negative juju just by making the conscious decision to do it.
I also was in conversation with other people. The parents of my friend Brittany just happened to be physical therapists and when she invited me over to their house for a meal they both gave me a treatment. We talked about the prescription I had been given by my Medicare doctor: 400 milligrams of ibuprofen 3 times a day. One time one of the gel caps got stuck in my throat and dissolved there - it was a vile, nasty taste. I knew that I was swallowing a chemical that was taxing my kidneys. They had to process that vile, nasty stuff. They suggested Aleve as an alternative, also an anti-inflammatory but easier on the body. I switched and it seemed to be just fine.
Another med I was prescribed was diclofenac sodium topical gel with carbomer homopolymer type C, cocoyl caprylocaprate, fragrance, isopropyl alcohol, mineral oil, polyoxyl 20, cetostearyl ether, propylene glycol, purified water and strong ammonia solution added as inert ingredients. Yeah. Pharmaceutical chemists like to mix it up. Also nasty smelling stuff and I was supposed to smear on my wrist, 4 grams exactly, 4 times a day. Brittany gave me a bottle of arnica oil (made from a plant in the sunflower family) and I started rubbing it into my wrist instead of the diclofenac sodium topical gel with etc, etc. It certainly smelled better and seemed to work well. I also massaged it into my neck where I had a crick from bike riding. Arnica oil also has anti-inflammatory properties so I figured, what’s the difference? If it works, it works. Besides I’ve got about a hundred sunflowers growing in my front yard so it seemed like a friendly option.
It’s been working. Slowly and gradually the pain has been dissipating and function has been returning to my fingers. I’m typing this with both hands on the keyboard, although gingerly, and mousing with my right hand. Still plenty of numbness and stiffness but I feel like I’m doing something right - this condition usually takes 2 or 3 months to resolve, I’m 3 weeks in. The night time pain has gone and not returned.
So anyways, that’s the story of my carpal tunnel syndrome. Learning how to speak to my body and listen, learning how to speak to my emotional body and listen. Learning how to speak to myself, essentially, and listen to myself. My self has some seriously wise things to say as it turns out. The doctor who is always in and has no fees, no insurance forms to fill out. God I hate that, turning healthcare into a business. Well that’s a rave on for another time. Actually I have already raved on that plenty.
I just want to say thank you to my body for the healing energy and insight that it provided. Thank you. And thank you for listening.
what I learned from my carpal tunnel syndrome