If you’ve been following me for a while you’ll know that growing up I had a rather complicated relationship with movement and feeling unsafe in my own body.
Due to a lifetime of dislocations, subluxations, spasms, slipped disks, and a whole lot of other painful experiences, it got to the point where even just watching someone on TV walk across ice or near a puddle made me feel physically sick.
As my health got worse in my twenties and I noticed a significant decline in my abilities, my (legitimate) fear of injuries spiralled. Staying in bed felt like the safest thing to do (not that it felt like a choice) and my world got smaller and smaller.
I didn’t know how to look after my hypermobile body, but five years ago I found someone to help me. And since then, I’ve slowly (like really slowly) been re-teaching my body that it does, in fact, have the potential to move in a safe way. It’s been both hard work physically and mentally, and it’s still something that I have to think about every day.
How we think about movement when living with hypermobility is a subject I’m super interested in, so I’m delighted to have had the opportunity to chat with Joint Hypermobility & Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome Movement Therapist, Jeannie Di Bon.
I’ve worked with Jeannie a couple of times in the past and I personally found her approach to the hypermobile body so refreshing.
In today’s episode of The Rest Room, we have a wide-ranging and personal discussion about topics like:
Why telling patients there’s nothing that can be done just isn’t good enough
Why any movement practice starts with safety
Treating the whole person
The importance of breathing & recognising our tension patterns
How to feel less fearful & start building body awareness
How to get started with a safe, sustainable movement practice
Breaking the boom & bust cycle
Learning the difference between “good pain” (or expected pain) and “bad pain”
How to build in consistency
Adapting to your own capabilities
Why there is hope….
…and much more!
Of course, like with every conversation about movement and activity, please always use your own best judgement about your health and your ability levels.
To listen, you can just click play at the top of this email, or you can listen on Apple, Spotify, Amazon and Google. If you’d rather read the transcript of the episode, I’ve made that available on my blog.
Please note: if you receive this email within the first few hours of it being sent out, it might take a few hours for the podcast to filter through to some of the podcast platforms like Amazon or Spotify.
Do check out Jeannie’s website and YouTube channel for lots of helpful information, videos and advice.
Thanks to my brilliant producer Philly Guillou at OG Podcasts, to Lucy Dove for the episode art, and to Amit Rai for my intro music.
Fear, Pain & Hope: Movement with Hypermobility