The Road Home
The story of how I healed myself naturally.
How it all began.
My healing journey began with getting let down by the medical system, as so many of us do.
I was a teenager in high school and was suffering from debilitating digestive issues that were making my young life utterly miserable. I had a constellation of symptoms that would now be diagnosed as IBS, but back in the 1980s that was still a poorly understood condition.
I had frequent episodes of stomach pain that sometimes had me doubled over in bed for hours at a time. I did all the things people do, like going to see my family doctor, getting referrals to specialists, taking tests. But every effort led to a dead end. I was offered pain killers and antidepressants, but got no actual answers, and no real help.
I was sent home from the gastroenterologist’s office with the message that it was ‘all in my head'.
So what’s a girl to do?
My mother was also at a complete loss, so she took a chance and brought me to see my ‘weird’ uncle George Roth, founder of Matrix Repatterning. At the time, he was a Naturopath which was a pretty bold career move for the early 80s. The alternative health movement was still in its infancy and he was a true pioneer in the field.
That visit changed my life. Although he didn’t cure all that ailed me, he certainly opened the door to a whole new world. A world that made a lot more sense to me.
So I walked through that door and never looked back.
I fully embraced holistic medicine and overhauled the way I was living my life. To this day I feel tremendous gratitude for my uncles lifelong influence.
I was truly lucky to have been exposed to this world at such an early age. And for whatever reason I had the instinct to dive right in. As a result, I have been healing myself naturally for the last 35 years.
The first big turning point.
My uncle helped me to understand that my digestive issues were caused by a combination of poor diet, imbalanced gut flora, and the effects of stress. He gave me tools to get started with changing my lifestyle habits.
By the age of 17, I had launched into a vegetarian diet, began using natural medicines, and started doing meditation. I felt some improvements but my first big turning point came quite unexpectedly through meditation.
The truth was I could barely make it past ten minutes sitting in meditation. It was absolutely agonizing for me. I tried stretching out my muscles to ease the tension, but the pain persisted.
Then through study, I discovered the concept of Dharana, which is the sixth limb in the Ashtangha yoga philosophy, also known as the Eightfold Path.
Dharana is the practice of holding your attention on a single point of focus, like a mantra.
The purpose was to prevent your mind from drifting.
So I took an innovative approach and made my point of focus the pain itself. I visualized my mind’s eye like a laser beam, and focused my attention directly on the sensation of pain in my body. And to my surprise the pain began to ease up. It softened around the edges and slowly started to dissolve.
With time and practice I could sit in the meditative posture pain-free, and actually enjoy the experience. My posture became long and strong as a result. I literally stumbled onto the mind-body connection and experienced first hand just how powerful it was.
It forever changed the way I approached healing my body.
The second big turning point.
The second big turning point in my healing journey happened not too long after.
I remember standing in front of the bathroom mirror, feeling like I was hitting a wall. I was frustrated that my digestive issues were still impacting my life. I had tried so many things but was still not getting the results I wanted.
As I stood there feeling desperate, I had the sudden instinct to just stop everything - all the remedies, the therapies, seeing health practitioners, doing endless research. And with my hands on my very unhappy belly I asked myself, ‘body what do you need?’.
From that moment forward I made the commitment to start listening to my body.
The truth was I didn’t know what my body needed. I was always trying to tackle the problem like a scientist. Relying on reason alone. Let’s face it, I was disconnected from my body. So I became curious. Maybe my body knew a lot more than I realized.
I started simple. Just paying attention to how I felt after eating certain foods. And my body let me know very clearly. I either felt energized or depleted. The meal either moved smoothly through my system, or it made me bloated and gassy. Crazy simple but in the end it was the most effective and fastest route to healing my digestive issues.
One year later I was a totally different person.
Over time I transitioned away from being vegetarian and just created the diet that was right for me. People always try to stick a label on me, assuming I must be vegan or gluten-free. But I dropped all the dietary concepts a long time ago. I rely on sound principles and listening to my body. Now my digestive issues are a thing of the past.
My experience with pain.
Since that early phase of my life, I have sustained numerous injuries from sports and car accidents, and experienced repetitive motion strain from my work.
I have been that person crawling on the floor with a bulging disc, trying to get my sad body to the bathroom first thing in the morning. I have been that person barely able to lift a glass of water or brush my teeth, because my hands were completely inflamed.
I have also worked with hundreds of people in pain through my massage practice over the last two decades. Needless to say I know pain very intimately. Fate or destiny, or both, has turned me into an expert.
But what makes my story unique is that I transformed my pain 100% naturally without medications.
I achieved that through listening to my body. By balancing knowledge with wisdom, and reason with intuition. Rather than relying on experts alone, I learned how to trust my body again and make empowered, authentic healthcare decisions. That helped me reach my goals faster, and with a lot less confusion.
My steps to healing.
Many health practitioners want to sell you on a specific solution to your problem. But the truth is there are no cookie cutter solutions. There’s no magic pill. The road you took to get to where you are now is totally unique to you. And so is the road back to health. When we look for a cure ‘out there’ we end up wasting a lot of time and money.
In the end, health is not something we can buy, it's something we have to cultivate on a daily basis. So now when I find myself in a health crisis, I have a set of tools that I can rely on to get me through.
I begin by grounding myself in the three mindset shifts essential to a successful healing journey:
1.
The body heals itself when given the
best possible conditions.
2.
If there is a need for healing in your life,
then healing is a part of your life purpose.
3.
Healing is the road back home to
the most authentic version of you.
Once I am in the right mindset for healing, I carve out some quiet time to be with my body.
I tune in and start listening. Beginning with setting the stage with a relaxing atmosphere that helps me get grounded into the moment. And I let my body do the talking.
Without fail what bubbles up to the surface is whatever is stressing me out at that time in my life.
How that feels in my body, and where it’s showing up. This quiet time lets me tap into the wisdom that exists at the intersection of my mind and body. It reveals where I need to be taking better care of myself.
In every case, my body will want me to focus on resting, digesting, and moving in a healthy way. Those are the three pillars of healing.
Once I am clear about what needs my attention, I start leaning into the natural remedies and self-care practices that have proven to work for me in the past.
Tools for healing.
I have tools that I absolutely love, that work really well for me. But what’s going to work for you will be different.
Three decades of healing myself naturally has given me a big repertoire of tried and true self-care practices. So if you’re looking for some inspiration, here are some Urban Healer favourites for you to explore:
