lightbulb moment - Why I now know that this wasn't sudden POP

When I suddenly felt a twinge during my normal workout, I knew that something was very wrong. I felt twinges and, not necessarily pain, I just felt odd. I quit my workout immediately, thinking, "oh no, I've really hurt myself". I spent the rest of the day feeling odd and instinctively feeling scared about what was happening in my abdomen. I thought about how hard I had been amping up my core, lower abs and back exercises because I understood that although I'd been working out 5 days a week and staying active, I was having some, more than usual, bladder leaks. These leaks were happening during sex, I wasn't sure. I was urinating, unexplainably, more often even through I was merely drinking plenty of water to keep up with an active workday and lifestyle like usual. I was planking and side-planking til I could sip tea and read a book while doing them, doing hanging knee up, lower ab exercise, tons of glute work being especially sure to tuck and externally rotate the femur to get that cheek squeeze. The ripped abs and buns of steel were just an bonus for the work to maintain a healthy posture and stay pain and symptom free (so I thought at the time).

I was so confused because prior to the "incident" I had also amped up my kegals and doing them while driving, sitting standing… I was even sitting on the stability ball and doing them while I trained clients at work all day. Even with all of this EXTRA work to keep my spinal integrity (which since all of my horseback riding falls, had become a lifetime of maintenance for my degenerative discs, hip disfunction…you name it), just 2 days before my incident, my neck pain was bad with burning and tightness. I was unable to hold my chin in or shoulders down and was more uncomfortable than I'd been in months when it came to managing my chronic neck pain.

That afternoon after the incident, I was so mad at myself. I thought that I hadn't worked hard enough, hadn't gone to yoga in a while like I had intended (I had been stretching myself), hadn't walked enough during the winter because of the cold, hadn't done enough hip work… I thought that I had hurt myself by not doing enough, or not going to to a spine dr for my neck or my hip which had been bothering me a little in the last months. But deep down, i knew that I had done everything that I knew, that I had worked really hard and paid specific attention to my weaknesses and strengthening the important muscles that have always helped my symptoms ( so I thought at the time).

It was that evening that the bulge came. I was feeling all kinds of odd, twinges in my abdomen and hip, again, not really pain. I was even feeling some sharp pain under my right breast and down into my ribs and hip on that side. These pains would take my breath away.

Here comes my lightbulb moment: My neck and shoulder pain had begun 8 years ago. When I entered a chi-running workshop to learn to run pain-free and naturally, I found my pain traveling to my forearm and wrist to the point that i couldn't hold a cup or my steering wheel on my car. My chi-running instructor pulled me aside an began to stretch me (all of the stretches that WW promotes). He then informed me that it is very common that breast augmentation can cause this pulling forward of the head and down of the chest and thus weaken the back and the hip and the integrity of the spine. I had gone for a second breast augmentation, just a year and 1/2 prior to this workshop, to correct my original surgery 10 years earlier. What a lightbulb moment. No one talks about this. The dr said to strap them down and let the scar tissue build to hold them in place while they heal. He never mentioned how it would affect my posture. Again, a year later when mentor number 2 came into my life. He was the best personal trainer in my large city and also happened to be a neuromuscular therapist. Guess what, he said that my pain, which I was managing, was from my breast augmentation. They cut through layers of muscle to insert the implants then let the scar tissue become the support system. He helped me with myofascial release of the scar tissue an stretching and strengthening.

Here's the real lightbulb moment. When I went to the PT for POP, I wanted to talk about my recent neck pain, hip pain and compromised posture and how it was related. Both PT's wanted me to lie on my back and do kegals. I didn't bother waisting my time asking them how my scar tissue from my breast augmentation might have contributed to this new symptom.

I cried when Christine told her story of being insecure and wanting to get the augmentation to be and feel more sexy. I had the surgery after birthing and nursing children in my early thirties. I had a fit, body that looked young for my age (I worked on it) but had skin and almost a concave chest to replace the nice full C young breasts that I'd had prior to children and nursing. I just refilled most of the skin, not fully because I was probably a DD or FF when nursing-lactated enough for the neighborhood. I was pleased and they looked natural and matched my young body again.

It was 10 years later (after my first augmentation surgery) when I found that my husband had been cheating and, I was thrown into the ugly world of divorce, that I decided that I wanted to get another surgery. It's recommended--ugh-- that the implants are replaced every ten years so that they don't leak. I was told that I was being healthy and smart with this decision. I was mainly selfishly thinking that I would get rid of that little bit of extra skin and thus make them even better. I was, after all, finding myself single in a town of beautiful young single women who outnumber the men 8 to 1. Men in my town are known for going younger because they can every night of the week. I felt lost and alone and never imagined myself being in that situation. I was acting out of fear. It was a low place and my low self-esteem, tragically, sent me into the surgeons office.

The left breast had some support stitches fail and it now hangs more softly than the right. The right is clearly tight underneath and is clearly blocking the function of my body: rotator cuff, cervical rotation…you name it all the way into my bad hip…still not sure if the neck or the hip would have ever been an issue without the augmentation which is the sad part of the story. My riding falls had not given my ANY trouble until after the 2nd augmentation surgery AND the stress from feeling abandoned and lonely. Those injuries may have been fine on their own. My foot definitely has suffered from the neck, hip and generally effects that the augmentation had on my posture.

Thank you Christine for sharing your personal story as there was so much for me to learn in it. That cry was needed in this healing process. I had to forgive myself. The connection of what I've done to try to control my body and how it has responded was a lightbulb moment. I will be gentle with it in WW posture and nurture it through this process.

I know that this was long but I feel better for saying it. I know it to be my truth and I hope that it will help some of you. Some of you are so young and if you hear enough of these stories, it may sink in. My "younger" self did't hear very well.

Namaste…

Sierra