Day 231 March 23, 2011

on the way to Cuban elementary school to drop off art supplies

One of my friends asked me how I’d managed to strain my neck, which is getting better slowly.  This is a good question.  For me it all started when I fell out of a tall tree as a young girl and was knocked unconscious.  An osteopath later suggested to me that I’d landed on my left hip.  I also remember falling in ice skating and the exact moment when I quit skating because falling on my skinny hips hurt so much.

As the years went by I dislocated my left shoulder, left knee and my left foot arch remains chronically, partially dislocated.  Add years of being bow legged, being right handed, and years of working on a potter’s wheel leaning constantly to the right as I worked on the clay forms.  Lots of small imbalances added up. 

Now that I’m getting older, add some osteo arthritis in my neck, upper back, hands and feet and voila, I injured my neck.  Not in headstand, not in shoulder stand, no, just by living my life with all these little imbalances built into my daily posture.  Almost forgot to mention the large heavy purse I carried on my left shoulder.  I have a tendency to overwork and overdue a lot too, but part of that is my inherited tendency for an over active thyroid, the thyroid that sets the metabolic rate of your body.  I zoom around a lot.

So there, that’s how I injured my neck.  Make sense?  Do you think in those terms about how you injure yourself?  Do you see the whole picture of your health?  Things do add up.