When I was twenty my right leg would start to sporadically swell. If I stood too long or sometimes just because, my calf would get tight and uncomfortable. I went to a lot of doctors, overnighted in hospital, and got no where. I was told I wasn’t dying, so…..
Two years later, I ended up going to a doctor in Dublin, where I was living at the time, for pain and discomfort in my lower abdomen. He palpated and told me I had a cyst. They took an ultrasound. This is your womb, they pointed, and that is your cyst…. they were the same size. I needed an operation because there was risk of it bursting or twisting and then I could die. Unlikely to be cancerous, but who knows until we’re in.
I came back to the UK, found a private gynaecologist (because the NHS said I would have to wait six months for surgery) who told me the cyst had been the cause of my leg swelling. A common occurrence, he said.
Key hole surgery, out later that afternoon and feeling good again in 24hrs. That was the plan.
Except the plan went wrong.
I bled out. Keyhole turned to emergency incision and four blood transfusions later, I survived.
And that became the beginning of everything….
I began to wake up to myself, my body, my health, my potential. Was it someone’s else DNA flowing through my blood? Was is the shock of trauma? Was is the closeness of death?
What I have come to understand for myself is that my health crisis was my awakening and I believe it holds that potential for many. My womb was infested with trauma from childhood abuse, it took a few years, but it has been cleansed and healed to become a bastion of rich womanly health and creative energy.
This moment in my life inspired me to understand health on levels far beyond the current model of mainstream medicine, restricted to symptoms and short term solutions.
What if we can allow all of our health crises to become the beginning of everything instead of the catastrophes of fear? What if we re frame disease as a call to reclaiming health and empowerment? What if each of these ailments is a gift of discovery?
Can you imagine the permission to be solely in charge of your own healing?
…. it’s the beginning of everything.