My Story with Chronic Pain

Today I wanted to share my personal story with you about a chronic condition I have been living with the past few months since October 2017 to be exact. I have what doctors like to call “Costochondritis”. When I first went to the doctor I wasn’t surprised when she diagnosed me with Costochondritis because of course, I went online to check out what matched with my symptoms before I even went to the doctor’s office. The goods news, as always, was that I wasn’t dying of a heart attack (*breathes deeply) which I actually feared at the time because my dad had passed away from a heart attack a few months before my terrible chest flare came up (and I also truly believe that this chest inflammation is due to grief which I hope to talk about later in my journal).

Seeing pain in a positive way

To be honest, ever since this pain came into my life it has made my mind become more in tune with my body and vice versa. I now have to be laser-focused on every single body movement I make and my movements have also slowed down which has actually made a great impact overall with my steel mace training. The pain even introduced me to qigong and tai chi movements for healing. Together they create such a great vibe and flow! That’s my unique style right there.

To me, a steel mace is a wonderful tool for healing your body and mind if you have any such pain in the body. When I got my first chest flare, I literally laid in my bed for an entire day in fear because 1) I didn’t know what the heck was going on and 2) It was a pain that took me by complete surprise and of course it was very painful. I mean painful enough to keep me from moving. I thought that was the end of my fitness training altogether! I thought crappy ass thoughts like “fuck what if I can’t ever pick up a kettlebell or do CrossFit ever again”. I had a lot of moments like that the first week of having the pain.

How i got past my negative thinking and picked up the steel mace again

So I know by this point you’re probably wondering what has happened since then. What got me off my butt? What gave me the strength to get past the pain? It wasn’t easy but I got over my crappy thoughts pretty quickly by bypassing them and holding that steel mace in my hands again. I read two quotes every morning when I woke up, I put it on my wall and they go like this:

“The pain you feel today is the strength you’ll feel tomorrow” and “Pain is weakness leaving the body”.

I read those quotes and I embodied them every single time I went out to get my unconventional workout. I did a lot of walking, a lot of positive self-talking, I read a lot of books, I watched Leo Savage and Matt Berbary on Youtube & Instagram to get inspired, I started to visualize my body healing as I held the steel mace in my hands.

So does it flow?

Does it work out? Yes! I believe exercise is a way of not giving up on your mind, body, and soul. Getting your ass moving will heal you. My pain is still with me from time to time but it has reduced tremendously. I have found ways to work around it and to not let it be an excuse to train hard even if that means finding focused and slow movements. Who said slow movements can’t get you in the best shape of your life? Don’t believe that shit. I believe it’s even better than putting too much stress on the body. We gotta make sure we listen to our bodies as it’s moving around. Pay attention and flow. Yes, you can still flow with really bad chest pain. You are limitless, you are indestructible and your body will always find a way to come back to you if that’s what you decide.

May the universe flow with you always,