Are you listening? Because I wasn’t!
I have had a tough year and a half or so. I don’t think anyone would dispute that fact. My husband was ill for about a year with surgeries, hospitalizations, and finally a terminal diagnosis ending in his last few months on hospice before his death. Two weeks later I found myself moving from Arizona to Texas to live with one of my daughters. It’s been a year of transition, of having the very earth under my feet shatter, so you’ll excuse me if I don’t feel very connected to my core, my heart, and my intuition. I don’t think I’m alone in this space either. Especially as I see the numbers for Covid-19 deaths rise. There are spouses and parents and children all suffering the similar craziness of grief that I have been. Now normally, I’m a person who walks with my intuitive antennae out and wiggling around. I live very intuitively. But my personal tragedy was so overwhelming that it was keeping me from feeling very connected to that gut feeling and I wasn’t listening.
I arrived in Texas on June 1, 2020. I was here for about a week and getting settled and things I needed, learning to know the new place, acquiring a storage place and all that stuff. On June 8, (I know this because I had only been here a week) I was walking my daughters’ dog when she decided to chase a squirrel. Eevee the dog is large, 80lbs at least. This is where I made my mistake. Intuition was quickly telling me to let go of the leash, but I thought it would be fine. I didn’t listen and ended up being yanked off my feet and doing a barrel roll (in the grass thank goddess) and snapping my right ribs out of place just under the sternum. My feet literally went out from under me that time. And the pain was excruciating. I had an x-ray, and it showed no breakage so that was the good part. It did take a month at least for the pain to go away completely though.
And when that month was nearly up, and the right ribs were almost healed, I went to a new chiropractor for an adjustment. In my chart it says not to adjust me lying on my side. I have scoliosis and it’s not effective. Well, this new chiropractor told me she noticed that it said not to, but she thought it would help me. My intuition said don’t do it, but the chiropractor is a doctor, so I didn’t listen to my intuition and I said, “well….okaaaayyy….” and you guessed it. She put the rib on my Left side just under the sternum out of place. I knew it right away too, but I was going to have to wait a day or two for all the muscles to calm down before I could have it put back. And now I was going to have another 3 weeks at least of left side rib pain.
Have I learned yet? Apparently not, because last week, I was eating dinner by my TV in my room. I decided I needed some water and I set my plate down on the bed. My intuition said, “don’t leave that in a place where the cats can get to it.” But I did leave that in a place where a cat could get to it. I came back a minute later, with a glass of water in my hand and saw the deaf cat (Junipurr) sniffing around my salmon cakes. You can’t yell at a deaf cat. In my rush to remove the cat, water in hand, trying to get over the baby gate (which keeps the dog out of my room), my foot got caught on the baby gate and…down I went on my right shoulder. Water everywhere and pain in my right rib just under the sternum.
Sigh.
Now I have a thing I do, about obstacles. If I am on a path and I hit an obstacle, I hop over it and keep going. The 2nd time I hit an obstacle on that path, I think, hmmm…but I hop over it and keep going. When I get to the 3rd time an obstacle is in that path, I rethink that path and what I’m doing there. Maybe this path is not for me. So, the 3rd time I hurt my ribs in less than 6 months was one of those “ah haa” moments. What is this trying to teach me? Obviously, I need to be more careful and more mindful, but looking deeper I realized that I had been ignoring that little voice inside me that helps me navigate the world. I’m not going to do that anymore. I am trusting myself again. I had to hurt myself 3 times, but I finally am getting the message. I think there’s another piece of this involving the ribs being the physical thing that protects the heart and since I’m grieving, there’s probably something there too, but I’m going to have to figure out that piece on my own time. The intuition piece I have painfully learned, loud and clear.
Author ~ Bishop Marie Wilkes