The fact that your entire life’s team of medical providers don’t know what exactly is in disharmony with you doesn’t mean that you are not curable or that the knowledge doesn’t exist elsewhere. The answer just doesn’t exist in their clinics and is probably hidden for a reason.
Original Quest
Chronic pain. I was taken on a complete DETOUR when all I thought I was doing was trying to fix a chronic lower back pain that never healed after a sprain from kayaking back in 2005. After two years of “common sense” therapeutic activities, I started to notice that not only was it not going away, it was getting worse – much worse, despite my numerous attempts to resolve the problem. That was when the detour began.
I thought I knew how to get better and that my body would just heal itself. I was told that simple back strains don’t usually continue for prolonged period of time, so I never suspected how I would end up on what I now call the initial phase of my naive search for medical help. After 2 years of medical massage therapy, physical exercises, and stretches, and increasing my movement through joining the gym, my problem became worse and worse. The moment I realized I truly needed more help was when the entire right side of my body literally froze and locked up, and I barely had flowing movement. That was when I finally dropped my reluctance to see a chiropractor, who assessed my limp and frozen body prior to offering a series of chiropractic adjustments. After committing to 17 dutiful visits, I still did not get better and was still suffering from aches, soreness, stiffness, pain, spasms, and lack of ability to move my normal range of motions, I was referred to another practitioner and that was when acupuncture and sports rehabilitation was added to my weekly treatment plan. Unfortunately, my body was not responsive and I experienced what it’s like to insult the egos of some dedicated wellness practitioners/doctors. I had been reading all the books I could find during that time about resolving pain as well as investigating the true and root causes of pain. I didn’t know it was such a convoluted topic. Really, I didn’t imagine it would be so complex and complicated.
When the providers observed that I was not improving after putting in a good year of effort and expensive visits with them, they told me something else was going on with me and that I needed to see a nutritionist and “get inflammatory responses addressed.” I was shocked and confused, and asked, “What in the world does nutrition have to do with my back and muscular pain?” The response truly perplexed and surprised me: “Everything.” After getting tested and diagnosed with possible “leaky gut” and “gluten sensitivity/food intolerance,” I was immediately placed on a plan to thoroughly and fully eliminate gluten, eggs, and dairy to begin with. It was too steep of a learning curve, coming from my Chinese American background, to cut out gluten and eggs, and I was in denial for some time until I learned to comply and become good at a preliminary elimination diet.
That was how the food journey started, and I had to blog to keep myself accountable and to remind myself of the realities of struggle. Blogging offered solace and release to my bottled up anger, frustrations, confusion, depression, and despair to the endless and bottomless path to full recovery. The curse was also a gift. I knew it deep down, but living day to day was sometimes just so hard that I didn’t have that “whatever it takes” in me any more. Reading other people’s recovery stories and detours comforted me and gave me hope, so in my own unique way, I wish to do this to contribute to that collective effort.
Ever-Evolving Quest
I believe that bad things may sometimes happen to help us collectively transform and evolve, because it is through anger and the strong desire to transform and improve our situations that lead us to explore alternative options and to learn new methods to thrive. The only way to survive what we all wish would just vanish is to find a way to befriend it and to learn from it through adequately open mind and increasing awareness. Perhaps it’s the broader evolution of human consciousness? I don’t know. It’s not important to label things or to argue about them. What’s important is to recognize a learning opportunity that can change and transform your life if you confront and face it with courage, vulnerability, acceptance, grace, and gratitude for the unexpected things that arrive.
About
My name is Christina and I own my unique journey full-heartedly through Detox Utopia. I believe our sentiments through our experiences are meant to be shared, and I am thrilled to have grown and developed wisdom, friends, renewed respect for Mother Nature, and clarity just from opening myself up to learning, even though it was hard and the last thing that I felt like I wanted to do. I am here to share and to encourage you to allow yourself to heal. The process of removing obstacles, barriers, and stagnation is, in form, detox. But detox isn’t the answer, nor is it a solution. It is a process, a journey, and most importantly, a story, crafted and compiled from organic living and experience. I hope the stories and insights fuel those who feel done from misery and suffering, because do you know how it turned out for me? It really didn’t have to be like that and indeed the ANSWER IS WITHIN YOU! So please don’t give up. It became a self discovery journey for me in the process to find my cure and answers, and even though I would have paid big bucks for any shortcut and silver bullet back then just to have my problem go away so I didn’t have to deal with being miserable, I would go through the same paths if given the opportunity to start over again on this journey. What turns a curse into a gift is how you enrich your experience living through it. Your transformation moment will come as long as you persist. I truly believe that.
Detox Utopia 