Intuition Failed Me

As my surgery date rapidly approaches, I keep wondering: how could I have not sensed that something was so wrong in my body? I've done a lot of activities like yoga, choir, and tai-chi that teach mind-body awareness. I'm perceptive about my health and my body; it irks me that I couldn't tell I had a problem.

I have always loved pushing myself physically - probably because it's a trait I admire in my Dad. I did my first full marathon, the Big Sur race in California, at aged 19 with my Dad. The race bib and excitement of the mass start got under my skin. It's hard to describe the feeling of community you get when thousands of people are sweating beside you to reach the same finish line. After the race, I knew my Dad was proud of me. The experience was addictive: even though every muscle in my body hurt, I was planning my next race. (Surprise, Dad had signed me up for a half-marathon the following week in the Redwood Forests).

My Dad did his first Ironman when I was in junior high, and I knew it was something I had to do. Finishing a race everyone else deemed impossible was very attractive to me; it was the ultimate test, the ultimate physical challenge, and the ultimate proof that I could do whatever I set my mind to. I signed up with my friend Keith to do the race after only doing one baby triathlon.

I'm not a naturally gifted endurance athlete, so I had to work hard for the ten months leading up to the race. The four hour runs and eight hour bike rides took their toll, and I'd start to feel pain and a kind of clinking sensation in my left hip. Of course training with triathlon nerds creates a groupthink mentality: eat the protein bars, buy a better bike, and ignore the pain! I reasoned that something was bound to hurt if I was doing an Ironman, so I didn't think my hip pain was anything serious. I just started taking Ibuprofen: it made the runs easier and the butt-pain during long rides tolerable. I finished the race and it is, without a doubt, one of my proudest accomplishment.

I marvel that I could finish the race in pain, take Advil every four hours, and still not know that something was wrong.

Last fall I started learning Olympic weight-lifting. I loved it. I miss it. I was good at: my Scottish-Germanic heritage was happy, I found an athletic activity I was actually good at! Seriously I should be schlepping cows around because I am very strong. I loved lifting the bar, stacking it with weights, and then dropping it on the floor after a set of squats. I loved the looks I'd get when I deadlifted almost as much as some bros at the gym and their masculinity was threatened.  I even loved the callous build-up on my hands. I was getting really into lifting when my hip began to deteriorate, and I could tell that lifting caused hip pain. It hurt but I still didn't think anything was wrong at a basic alignment level.

The funny thing is that people have asked me if I ever suspected something was wrong with my hip. Their tone belies that I should have sensed it. This basic assumption exists (and I know because I once shared this belief) that anyone in touch with their body should intrinsically know if something is really wrong. We've all seen the medical dramas where the beautiful surgeon wonders why didn't the patient come in sooner before the tumor started growing so big. If you can't blame the illness on something tangible like smoking, unchecked diabetes or obesity, then the fault of the illness must lie somewhere in the person. I still find it hard to believe that my bad hip isn't somehow my fault.

It's hard to accept the fact that things happen randomly; that you didn't luck out in the gene pool; that something you have no control over could affect your life so profoundly. Sometimes I think that if I'd been easier on my body and foregone the marathons I wouldn't be sitting at home on a Monday waiting to go for surgery on a Wednesday. But then I wouldn't be who I am right now, and I don't wish for that. I now know that I can't intuit everything that happens to me. Life happens without my control or permission, and I just have to deal with it one day at a time.