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Listenting to your body when you have PF
I had to hit pause last week. If you follow my column, Make Every Breath Count, you know I was recently hospitalized with shingles in my left foot and lower left leg. This resulted in drop foot on my left side.
I am home and learning to use a walker. Last week was exhausting for me with medical appointments. My body was telling me to rest. I needed to listen.
How good are you at listening to your body? Do you hit pause when you should?
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2 Replies
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I absolutely listen to my body now; if I don’t hit ‘pause’ when necessary, my body will hit it for me and it means business when it does!
Back before IPF I was driven; I believe many of us were whether we realized it or not. A culture existed that you worked whether you were feeling “off” or not, either because it was expected or you’d feel guilty, heaping your work load on to someone else who already had a load to carry
IPF is a harsh teacher when it comes to listening to your body. Now when I need to sit, I sit. If I need to nap, I nap. If certain things don’t get done, so be it. I take time to sit and look at the ocean, watch the birds at my feeder, appreciate a stunning sunrise scattering rays of orange, purples, and peach, across a cloud-filled sky at dawn, and not one shred of guilt finds its way into my thoughts.
No one ever lay on his deathbed wishing they’d worked harder or more. Through this hideous disease we all bear that will ultimately win in the end for most of us, for the time being as long as I’m still here, I listen to my body and appreciate the hard work it’s done to get me to where I am at the moment.
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I notice that as I continue, the point at which my body starts messaging me comes sooner. On the days when I push too hard, I will take longer to recover. If only I had listened to my body!
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