Injured list over here! I had a moderately entertaining but quite painful run in with a fawn recently. It was the dog, and not one of the horses, who broke my toe but that doesn’t mean it hurts less. The fawn, who clearly wanted to play, approached us while we walked in the forest preserve. Bambi finally decided it was a bad idea to play with a 90 lb. dog, who was barking his head off, when I got thrown on the gravel and started screeching. Now that I use my body so much for work and life, I tend to get instantly worried when I get hurt because I know I will be in pain for weeks to come. So, besides cuts and bruises, my second toe somehow bent the wrong way and broke. After icing, buddy taping and hobbling around for a couple of weeks, I decided to try acupuncture at the advice of a loved one.
Speaking with the acupuncturist made me realize how many overlaps exist between her field of work and mine. We had a wonderful conversation about:
-How important it is to treat the whole body and not just the part that is painful or seems to be the source of the issue. Like when people ask why I am working on a horse’s shoulder when it is their hind leg that is stuck and I explain that compensatory patterns have many parts.
-How blockages in energy in one area affect so many other parts of the body, mind and spirit.
-How less is more and that pushing the body only adds to stress levels- making it harder to heal.
-We both favor the approach of supporting and holding the physical body so that is has time and space to turn on what is needed to heal from within.
-Realizing that our physical body is often our best change to notice, to listen to and to change a pattern in our life that is no longer serving us.
I have the feeling we could have gone on for hours but by now I was settling in for my treatment. I look forward to future conversations with like-minded healers!
Oh, and the bonus – two treatments and my toe is pain free and back to 90% range of motion. I highly recommend The Emporer’s Medicine in Naperville for anyone looking for Acupuncture and Functional Medicine.
Appleyard Equine Bodywork 