“To be ‘strong’ now is to be tender and ever so gentle with myself.”

Two days ago, I was being ever so creative with “getting exercise time in” that I was doing jumping jacks at the bottom of our neighbor’s stairs while my daughter rang the doorbell to see if her friend could play.  I was jumping and jacking and running in place with knees up and feeling pretty proud of myself.  And then…I lost my footing and came down hard on my left ankle, and fell.

Holy tamole, that hurt!  I am pretty ok in the face of pain…usually.  I refused pain medication when I was 32 weeks pregnant and needed out-patient surgery (foolishly).  I went 28 hours in labor without pain medication (foolishly).  I’ve had injuries from playing soccer and other childhood “adventures.”  But as my friend opened their front door and saw me sprawled out on their sidewalk, holding my ankle, I was in pain and now, these days, I wasn’t trying to “act all tough”: it hurt and I was rocking back and forth, holding it.

A trip to get x-rays, and a golf-ball swollen and black-and-blue ankle later, I found out it wasn’t broken but rather sprained.  “So you’ll have to stay off of it for awhile,” the doctor said.

“How long is ‘awhile’?” I asked.

He looked at me.  He already knew from giving my patient history that I am a mom to two little ones.  He could see that I am a mover-and-shaker, I have energy to me.  “So, two weeks.”

Me: “Two weeks!  You mean I have to ‘stay off of it’ for two weeks?”

Doctor: “There are two schools of thought about this.  One is: get back up and get mobile.  The other is: give it the TLC it needs to heal before getting back ‘out there.’  I go for TLC.”

Me: “So two weeks – literally not being on it?”

Doctor: “Yes.  I’d rather you do that than come back here in a month and tell me how much pain you are in and how it hasn’t healed and then we put you in a cast you can’t take off.  And then you’ll really just have to give it TLC.”

In that moment, I decided the TLC route was the one I would take.  Period.  Without a doubt.

So we got home and Brian “set me up” on the couch, with our puppy and kiddos (they are always going to jump on me and I love that), an ice pack, and pillows for elevation.  And this is where I’m going to be for 14 days.

You see, years ago, I would have “pushed through.”  I would have bandaged up my ankle, maybe rested for that evening, and then the mess in the kitchen would’ve called to me.  Puppy would’ve been giving me those sad eyes and I would’ve been like “Ok, a little walk couldn’t hurt.”  I would’ve said something to myself – semi-consciously under my breath – “I have to keep going.”  I would’ve given into that B.S. belief that “being strong” means “to keep going” and “resting” is wimpy.

I did that when my first child was born.  After 32 hours of labor, no sleep for 48 hours (and I mean “no sleep”), an emergency c-section,  and complications afterward, I STILL had that belief circulating in me.  When we finally got home, I pushed myself.  I was “mindful” of what the doctor said – don’t take the stairs, take it easy, only lift up baby – but I was still “charged up” from a traumatic birth and the operative belief in me was: be strong and keep going.

Now, eight years later, after lots of meditation, healing, quiet, and “going within”, that belief is gone.

Strong doesn’t mean “keep going” when I am hurt – emotionally, physically, psychologically.

I now equate “strong” with things like “being vulnerable” and “tenderness” and “gentleness.”

When I sit with a mom – friend, client – and she has the courage to “bring me into” the places and spaces where she feels vulnerable, alone, disgusted, angry, and “incomplete” — THIS to me is strength.

When I choose to “sit with” what is aching, what is yearning, what is hurting…THIS is strength.  THIS is being strong.

When I take the time to tend to that ache – with my loving attention, kindness, and tenderness – THIS is true strength.

How many mothers, in particular, have I counseled, coached, sat with and held who have shared with me that they, too, felt this belief within them: be strong and keep going?!  Still healing physically, emotionally, psychologically from giving birth, so many moms are “out there” in the world within even just a few days, jogging, losing that “baby weight,” and “back to their routine.”  And then, years later, many of these moms come to me.  They are aching – still holding trauma in their bodies; they have been going and going; their nervous systems are amped up and they are exhausted…yet they “can’t stop.”

Some could look at me and say, “Of course you can ‘stop’ and ‘tend to yourself.’  You have a lovely husband who supports you.”

Yes, I do.  AND there are a hundred other reasons I could name that would talk me out of deeply caring for myself and giving myself permission to heal.

All of us have our own “reasons” (I won’t call them excuses) for why we “can’t stop” or “why we have to be strong and keep going.”  And we can keep feeding ourselves those reasons — for decades.  Until we HAVE to stop.  Until we HAVE to be still.  Until we HAVE to be vulnerable. Until we HAVE to do the “work” necessary to heal — the “work” of learning to be radically tender and loving and kind to ourselves — the “work” of skillfully “holding” our traumas.

So over the next two weeks, you’ll find me resting.  Oh yes, I’ll feel that temptation to “get up and keep going” (it’s in the water!).  But I will remind myself again and again – a hundred times if I have to (and you remind me, too! OK?) – that I am doing the most important “work” by resting and healing.  I am doing the most important “work” by giving myself permission to “let the body do what it knows it needs to do” to heal.

And, ya know what?!  I’ve seen this now in my own life and in the lives of others — by giving myself this spaciousness to heal — by creating the conditions for healing to occur — I will be even more creative, focused, “all-energy-available” to be a presence for those I serve in this world and the work I do.

So, dear readers, if you are aching in any way – nursing an injury, tending to a grieving heart — give yourself permission to pause.  Give yourself permission to drop that old belief that “to keep going is to be strong.”  Start telling yourself another story — a healing story — one of “It’s time to rest, Love.  It’s time to nourish yourself into wholeness.”

And if you want to begin to deeply nourish your nervous system and be able to really rest, may I suggest this meditation?  It’s deeply healing and supportive.  25 minutes of deep rest and renewal:  Relaxation Meditation.