In my little room in the corner of the clinic, I hear about and see so much grief. So much devastation and heartache. So much resilience and inspiration too, but a lot of sadness and sometimes trauma. Grief over the loss of a loved one, the loss of a baby, the loss of innocence. Grief over the inability to get pregnant or over a birth going very differently from the original birth plan. Grief over a hysterectomy or not being able to be intimate with a partner because of pain. So often, this grief has brought them here to see me. Because grief becomes pain. Like, literally, it can become pain in your body. It's almost, in a non scientific way of looking at it, like your heart can't take it all so it becomes physical pain because it has to go somewhere. Not for everyone of course, but very much for some.
I am a Pelvic Health PT. I deal with pain in places that people don't want to talk about, don't want to hear about, don't want to think about. I ask the questions that sometimes people don't want to answer because inside they know it'll bring more pain to talk about it. But honestly, to heal the pelvis, sometimes you have to heal the grief too. Not me I mean, because it takes a village, and most of the time they have many other people fighting for their healing as well - therapists, psychologists, psychiatrists, counselors, priests. But it is part of my job to explain to people how these feelings - these traumas and struggles, fears and emotional distress - contribute to their pain. It's a long story all about brain chemistry and chemicals circulating all through your body and leading to dysfunction, pain, then more dysfunction, then even more pain. Pain science is for real, and it's incredibly interesting. Typically we talk about stress and how this leads to pain, but often it's the grief that causes the stress. Because grief is no joke, and when your brain perceives that, it very often begins a vicious cycle that leads to pain. Sometimes just for a short term, but sometimes for years. Then, the pain makes you even more tired, more discouraged, more desperate and often depressed.
I tend to see people at their worst. They've often spent years in pain being passed from one practitioner to another and then as a last resort, they end up in this corner room with all the windows and sunlight flooding in, sitting there gripping the purple chair in either fear or desperation or just annoyance at yet another appointment to sit through. But my job is to try and bring hope, and we start by talking. We progress through ups and downs, setbacks and triumphs, laughter and tears. And so often, when we get to the bottom of the inevitable question of "why" it comes back to grief. What are you grieving? What happened, who is lost, what is lost, what is buried deep inside of you that brought you here? It's heavy stuff sometimes.
When my Nana died I was there, in the hallway, just then texting my husband an update and waiting for an NG tube to be placed, and then in the next moment the door flew open and the blue light flashed over the door and she was gone. This loss was the one that I couldn't tuck away, that wouldn't just shut itself in some little place in my brain again. This year I have grieved the enormous loss of one of the most special people in my whole world as well as the losses of my Granddaddy, my sweet little Charlotte dog, the growing up of my children, times lost with loved ones who couldn't be present for one reason or another, and friends who have moved on. Sometimes the weight of all of it makes me feel like I can hardly walk forward. And sometimes it's literally painful. My neck is full of trigger points and my back is aching more than usual. For others, it's pelvic pain. Painful intercourse, pain with sitting or with exercise. It's a physical manifestation of deep pain that doesn't seem to know where else to go.
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| Lacy and Nana before a high school Christmas dance, c. 2000 |
Treating pelvic pain is a lot different than what I expected. Not because it's harder than other PT or because the pain is worse, but because many times people have no idea how the pain came about. It's not a sports injury or a slip on the ice. It's often a mystery. But so often, when we get deeper, there is something inside, in the past, that needed a place to go. In a way, experiencing this grief for nearly a year has been good for me, it's helped me to empathize in a different way with my patients, to understand the hurt in a way that I didn't before thanks to my brain's protective mechanisms. I had buried that away, but now it's always right here. So I get to relate to their pain in a way that I couldn't before. Yes, I too have had pelvic pain and yes, it was hard living with that for those years, but now I understand on a deeper level. Now I see not just how pain can cause grief, but how grief can cause pain.
*For more information on pain science, chronic pain, and more check the link in the blog above.
Dr. Lacy Kells PT, DPT
The Physio Down Low @ Advanced Physical Therapy Solutions
910-423-5350
lacy.kells@aptsnc.com
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