When your body won’t cooperate

I have been dealing with back pain for over 20 years.

It started in high school – warming up for a football match, everything felt good … then * snap *, my back grabbed. I had no idea what had happened. All I knew was: it hurt, I could barely move and I was afraid.

This moment began a life trip of learning on physical form, mobility, prevention of injuries – and also learning face When you realize that everything is not under your control.

I learned to train better. I ate a nutritious diet. I prioritized sleep and I regularly followed the corrective exercises prescribed by my doctors and physiotherapists. But even if I was doing “everything correctly” – every 6 to 24 months, I would be touched by a serious push of the back. Sometimes it would last a few days. Sometimes I fought with her for years.

The last one was the worst.

I spent months to twist a literal C form. I couldn’t stand up straight. I couldn’t move as I wanted. And more than physical pain, it was the mental spiral It did me.

“Will I be stuck like this?”

“How long will it take this time?”

“Who am I even if I can’t move or teach or coach as I did?”

It spoiled my identity in which I was not even fully aware at first.

I am the coach. The coach. The guy who teaches others to move well. I am the father who fights on the ground with his children. Who takes care of physical work around our house.

Now I was working on the bed and wondered if I would feel “normal” again.

In the end, I got out of pain again (not everyone does). And it taught me precious lessons.

What I learned:

✅ Play your hand, you are treated.

It turns out that I have a congenital vertebral stenosis (a narrowing of the spinal canal). I did not cause it. I cannot “repair” it. But I can build a plan around him. Physiotherapy and strength training are very similar! In its simplest form, everything is a version of “exhibition therapy”. Stress your body just enough and, in good manners, to get the answer you want. Not too much, not too little.

Over time, I learned the movements that are more likely to cause a push. And I can organize my training to build a greater “buffer” of strength and mobility in this area.

This is not what I would have chosen for me. But it’s the best way to answer.

✅ Recovery is mental as much as physical.

Do not reduce the mental and emotional toll that an injury undergoes you or a loved one. You can do all the “good things” and always feel like you are not progressing if your brain is flooded with pain, fear, frustration or shame. You may not even recognize the impact he has on you! I often felt As if I managed everything that was great. But my loved ones could see the assessment of mental stress (not to mention physical pain) that trained me.

I learned this sentence from one of my mentors, and it always resonates with me to date. “Start where you are. Do what you can. Use what you have.” It is much easier to say than to do, but to fall back on this state of mind helped me in some of my darkest moments.

✅ The movement is still worth fighting.

Even when it takes months. Even when it is slower than I want. Even if the exercise does not have the same appearance as before. It is always worth working.

The mental and physical advantages of the movement, in any The shape I can do, are too powerful to ignore.

✅ The same solution does not work every time.

It was one of the most difficult to learn. There was no “one size” solution to my pain.

• Sometimes the heat helped. Sometimes not.
• Sometimes an exercise felt good. Sometimes it seemed horrible.
• Sometimes anti-inflammatory oral steroids have helped. Sometimes they didn’t do it.

It made me learn to approach each new push as an experience. To take every day like a small test of what I could do. And it is the same approach that we have learned to adopt with our own customers – even those who do not deal with an injury or a chronic condition. What has worked for them in the past can give us clues, but it may not be the best current solution for what they need.

More than anything, it made me a better coach.

I understand now –Really Understand – how people suffer from chronic pain or injury.

Fear, doubt, sorrow to lose part of what makes you You.

This perspective made me more empathetic, more flexible and more useful – and it is something that I have tried to transmit to all of our coach staff here at Nerd Fitness.

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If you are dealing with pain, back or feel that your body has betrayed you lately, I see you.

It could take longer than you want.

It may seem different from what it was before.

But you can always strengthen strength, confidence and momentum even now.

And if you ever need help to understand how to do this in a way that corresponds to your body, your story and your reality? I would love to help.

Just get me a message.

– Matt coach