Anchors

Everyone has had an injury or been in pain. Everyone. We all have difficulty in these situations, and understandably so. They’re hard. In my practice the physical realm is where we tend to focus, however the entirety of the person affects how they move and how they feel. If we anchor ourselves to the pain or the injury, we begin to identify with them. They become a part of us and even begin to define us. The folks that can absorb the blow, modify their trajectory and then move forward are the ones that succeed most often in physical therapy.

There is an entire subset of physical therapy dedicated to chronic pain because it is such a prominent aspect of what we do. Injuries do more than affect localized tissues, they make changes to our brains. They rewire them. Real estate once dedicated to that body part immediately becomes more sensitive to input from the environment. This is all a normal part of sustaining an injury. Where we get into trouble is if those changes take hold and weigh us down, not allowing us to move on.

One of the amazing things about the human body is how adaptable it is. We can change readily, if we allow ourselves to. This means acknowledging the injury and what it might mean for us, identifying steps to repair it and looking for ways to move forward. Movement is one of those ways. Using the affected part of the body begins to train the body and the brain to heal. That happens via restoration of normal cellular environments locally while systemically the brain gains the perspective that the affected area is not a threat. The perception changes. That change is what promotes our ability to move ahead and get on with our lives. If we anchor ourselves to the idea that this injury will not heal, that it will forever hold us back and that it will never improve then our lives remain stagnant. The moment of injury keeps us from fulfilling our potential.

Pain is a part of being human. We have the opportunity to learn from it, even appreciate it. Initially the anchor that it is can be useful to keep us from moving too quickly, but in the end we must free ourselves from it.  We can rebuild and construct a new vision for what we want to be.

Austin Ulrich, Physical Therapist