I was listening to a podcast from Wisconsin Notes featuring Hillary Allen. She is a sky-runner, meaning she does ultramarathons on extremely steep mountains, climbing 4000 m each race. She’s a North Face athlete as well as an anatomy professor (!!!). A nerd, an athlete, like me.
In one of her races last August, she fell 150 feet and broke multiple bones in her body, undergoing numerous surgeries, rehab, and a journey back to running and competing. The podcast, though partially about her physical battles, was mostly about mental struggle. Mental struggle during the fall. Mental struggle from the pain. Mental struggle from the surgeries, from questioning whether or not she’d ever run again, from wondering if the day she was living in was worth it.
Towards the end, she talked about how she’s not the same person she was a year ago.
I’m not the same person I was a year ago. September 16, 2017 was two weeks before my TEDx talk. September 16, 2017 was two weeks before my 3:14 marathon, before I qualified for the Boston Marathon, a marathon I won’t run.
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Yesterday, I posted a picture of my PT friends, Amanda and Rachel, and myself smiling at a Brewer’s game. I sent it to my mom, who said we all looked so happy. We did look happy. But before posting it, however, I focused on my cheeks and how I thought that my face looked fat. I tried to find a filter that shadowed the parts I disliked about my body. I almost didn’t post it, and then when I did, I wrote a really clever caption, one that hid what I actually thought of the picture and of myself.
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You’d think that after 5 years of therapy for an eating disorder I’d be ready and able to recognize when I needed to see my therapist. You’d think I’d recognize the signs: a flare up of eating disorder thoughts, food restrictions, not being able to sleep, low motivation, not showering as often (because what’s the point in spending time to take care of myself?), isolating myself, pretending to be fine, and yet spending a lot of nights crying myself to sleep. But it took my mom and dad and one of my best friends telling me I had to get myself in after a panic attack outside my grandma’s birthday party to understand just how bad it had gotten.
I am not the same person I was last year. I am not the same person that other people think I am. I can have friends and relatives tell me I’m strong, I’m loved, and that they’re proud of me but I struggle to believe it. I don’t believe them because I project my own self-doubts on them: that I am broken, I’m lost, I’m “damaged goods”.
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Last night, I told my family that school was going well, but “moving fast”, but I couldn’t tell them that I feel like I will forever be behind, that an assignment that a professor sprung on us made me think I should drop out of PT school because I’m not capable, that I am constantly convincing myself to stay. I told them that Danny and Colleen are having an amazing time on their honeymoon and that I love them so much, but I didn’t say that I’m afraid that compared to them, I’ll never be in as loving of a relationship, that I think I’ll end up eternally single, and that my plan of moving to India with girlfriends at 35 when we’re all unmarried actually is, to me, realistic. I told my family that I was so happy that I ran for the first time in 159 days on Friday, but I didn’t tell them that I still resent that I ever got hurt.
I watched a movie called Stronger about Jeff Bauman and his recovery from having a double trans-femoral amputation after the Boston Marathon bombing, and balled my eyes out, first, because I thought I didn’t deserve to cry because I still had my legs, and second, because I qualified for that very race and I don’t know if I’ll run a marathon again.
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The whole time I’ve been writing this, I’ve wondered if it’s too negative. If it’s too personal. If it’s too much of a downer. If anyone will feel the same way and reach out, or will have stopped reading after the first …
Each day, I wake up with hopes of a better today than yesterday. Each day there are consolations, each day there are desolations. Each day passes, with physical and mental accomplishments, occasionally really good moments, and frequently dark clouds. I’m 18 weeks post-op, and it’s hard to believe that I’ve made it this far and still am struggling with the idea that I almost skipped the game on April 8, that all of the events, breakups and first dates, sitting on the sidelines, mental struggles, personal doubts, high points (Danny’s wedding!!!), and low points could have been either prevented, or approached in a different light.
Anytime anyone asks me about my surgery and recovery, they say “are you running yet?” “When are you cleared?” “You must have learned so much from this, huh?” “Do you think you’ll be a better PT because of this?”
And I say, as of two days ago, yes. I’ve learned a lot. I will be better able to empathize with patients from this experience. But what I don’t say is way more important.
I don’t say that the physical struggle is barely a struggle. The pain post-op was excruciating, but there are medications for that. I hated being dependent, but I loved living with my parents. I resented missing out on summer, that I only put a swimsuit on once, but I still got to be outside a lot.
I don’t say that the mental battle is way worse. Convincing myself daily to keep going, to put on a good face, especially when people reply to me saying I’m gonna run to the bathroom with “oh, you’re gonna RUN to the bathroom”, to believe that I will come out of this “stronger” when my muscles are atrophied and my soul is worn out, to take each day as an independent opportunity for self-care and watch them change to weeks and to months… that’s the hard part of surgery.
The pain passes. Finding a deep, strong part of myself that emerged and grew moderately with eating disorder recovery, and is absolutely necessary now, that’s the hard part of surgery.
Watching people do the activities I love, like running, climbing, swimming, racing, jumping, while telling myself that I’ll get there and that right now, my job is to heal, that’s the hard part of surgery.
Taking care of myself when all I want to do is stay in bed, avoid meals, and avoid human contact, that’s the hard part of surgery.
Thinking running for the first time would ultimately solve all of my problems, that I would cry happy tears, that I would feel more like myself, and yet not be surprised when it isn’t what I expected it to be, and rather have my knee feel weird and my heart a little sad, that’s the hard part of surgery.
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There’s something so vulnerable and necessary about saying I’m struggling that I hate but need. There’s something so necessary about admitting to myself, and in admitting to you all, that I should hold myself accountable, call the Counseling Center tomorrow, and make myself a nourishing and complete dinner, that I hate but need. There’s something so necessary about risking texts from people who read this asking if I’m okay, or risking questions from Jeff (PT, we’re friends on Facebook) at our next session as to whether I’m okay, that I hate but I need. I am not the same person that I was last year, but in a year, I think I’ll be able to say the same.
recoveredbutnotrelieved 