Everything is connected
When my arms finally started hurting badly enough to interfere with work, a few months ago, I bought this book. It says that RSI is a problem caused by the entire upper body. It’s all interconnected. Tightness in the shoulders and neck, hands held in the same position all day, poor posture, stress. We’re overloaded at work right now and it’s incredibly stressful. My parents are going through a nasty divorce and my younger brother is getting caught in the middle. We just lost a beloved pet. There’s a big hole in our living room ceiling right now where the plumber investigated the water suddenly dripping from the ceiling. I’ve been using the computer obsessively for years without respecting my body enough to give it proper accommodations. Being a highly sensitive person. All connected, all causing pain.
Until then, it never even occurred to me that all those things were making my arms hurt.
During my first massage appointment with the fantastic Liz, she noted, too, that everything is interconnected. Then I came home and read this post from Havi Brooks about her arms being a barometer for pain and stress, and went around mentally shouting YES YES YES for the rest of the day. In Havi’s mental negotiation with her arms, she says, “I can’t protect you from pain! Life involves pain. How can I make promises about future pain? Plus, what if I stub my toe tomorrow? Of course there will be pain. I resent the idea that I could just decide not to have pain in my life (though I admit I also find it appealing).”
I can’t do anything about some of my stress. I can’t make my parents end their relationship peacefully. I can’t ease my brother’s pain. I can’t directly influence the process of hiring someone to help take some of my workload. I can’t bring pets back to life or prevent plumbing crises. How unfair, for my own body to be giving me pain over things I can’t fix.
Havi’s arms, which seem to be reading my arms’ minds (or something), say:
“My arms: …We don’t give you pain. We just announce how much pain there is in your system. And when we think you have been given too much, then we protest it because it’s not fair for you to be in so much pain.
Me: You’re on my side?
My arms: Hello! We’re your arms.”
Oh.
I can’t fix all those problems above, but there are things I can do. I can do things to help my body be less tense, stretches and exercises and strength training and massage. I can try to eliminate stressful situations and commitments within my power to influence. I can respect my highly sensitive personality and invest in noise-cancelling headphones for work so the constant noise in the hall doesn’t stress me out as much. I can modify my computer desk at home, and at work as much as I can, to a more healthy environment.
Right now it sure doesn’t feel like my arms are on my side. I’ve been slowly increasing the ways I listen to and respect what my body needs for the last couple of months, and it seems like they hurt more than ever. There’s not really a choice, though: I can ignore my body and lose all use of my hands for sure, or listen to it and at least have a chance of healing.
