Unplugging to heal

The smackdown

I’d had a busy summer of fun, sunshine and waves down here in NZ. I’d been away on two surf trips and participated in contests with surfers from around the country. I met some great people and pushed my edge a little surfing these new spots. 

On returning home I was pleasantly surprised with even more wave action and so it continued. I had one of the best sessions of the summer on a Tuesday eve at a favourite spot. Glassy conditions as the sun lowered itself towards the horizon. One of those sessions where everything came together – body, mind, equipment and the ocean (don’t let social media fool you, these are far rarer than you think). 

The next morning I was excited for a repeat experience. I did my usual assessing of the conditions and the line-up and noticed it was smaller than the forecast and I’d brought the wrong board. A friend offered me a spare longboard to try out and I happily accepted. Ten minutes in, I hopped off my second wave and was holding my board about to turn and paddle back out. 

Without warning or seeing what was coming, a huge SUP (stand up paddleboard) came from behind and hit me on the side of the head around my right temple area. I remember multiple hits actually, one to the head and eye and then arm, shoulder. I knew in that instant it was bad and cried out. I also knew I had to get myself out of the water and onto land. 

The guy who’s board it was, was lovely and accompanied me into the beach to make sure I was okay. He’s an accomplished surfer so losing control of his board was unusual for him but just one of those freaky things that can happen. 

A conditioned response

My initial response was clouded by shock and a series of ‘I’m fine, I’ll be rights’ coming out of my mouth without any conscious consideration or understanding that I may not be.

I later recalled falling off my horse when I was a kid and breaking an arm but being forced to get back up and continue riding for two hours to complete the training I was doing. I learned young to grit my teeth and just get on with it. 

A few days later another memory surfaced, a car accident when I was seven, that I hadn’t thought of in years! Our babysitter was driving and I was in the passenger seat. She drove straight across an intersection and into a cliff giving me whiplash on the impact. I was given no check-ups or treatment. I remember Shirley, the driver being distraught and having a mini nervous breakdown afterwards but I stayed quiet and got on with it. 

The healing period was fascinating for the memories and thoughts that rose to the surface for observation, clearing and reframing. It turns out, a decent head knock can lead to deeper insights and healing on more layers than just the obvious if you’re open to it. Although I don’t prescribe it as a method! 

Concussion as a teaching experience

Here’s a few things I’ve learned while healing my head injury;

The immediate effects were not pleasant, they included; pain, swelling of the brain tissues, brain fog, feeling woozy, dizzy, dozey and fatigued, not feeling like myself, anxiety, grief (so many tears for the first few days), weird stories emerging like ‘maybe I deserved it’, ‘maybe I invited this in by focussing on danger in the surf’ (for context, a friend had just suffered a severe spinal injury in the surf just days before so it was top of mind), thoughts like ‘will I ever be normal again’.

I also had some surface, physical stuff like a black eye, bad bruising down one arm elbow to shoulder causing pain and discomfort. But knowing that all of these were HEALING symptoms, invited curiosity and compassion to the table. 

When the busy mind is silenced or has the volume on its channel of endless crap FM turned down, deeper truths and whispers from the soul or intuition can be heard. I’ve found immense gold in this alone. 

The body knows best and when listened to will give direction on what it needs at any given time. That may be a lie down after breakfast or later in the day, sound healing, aromatherapy, water with salt added, particular herbal teas or foods, less of something, more of something else. It knows!

Unplugging from as much as possible leads to faster healing. This makes sense right? How can the body focus on healing and giving you those subtle cues for what it needs to get better if you’re constantly plugged into social media and google doing panicky searches for how to treat head injuries. It’s likely to cause an even greater headache as you then have to sift through a thousand different opinions and well-meaning advisors who aren’t you and don’t know your body. Many of them trying to sell you their ‘fix’. 

“Almost everything will work again if you unplug it for a few minutes, including you.”
― Anne Lamott

When looking for advice or educational content, dismiss anyone with a victim mentality or worst case scenario slant and opt for those who are optimistic and promote self-responsibility and empowermen

I found this guy’s free webinar on concussions to be really helpful. It explains the biology still in a mainstreamy way but with a totally different perspective to anything you’ll find via a google search. He also gives realistic timelines for healing, properly defines what a concussion is and is not and offers tips for recovery. He also on-sells his program but I personally got enough from the webinar to leave it there. 

I usually consult the GNM (German New Medicine) perspective as well as other mind-body esoteric systems however for me, these were not as practically helpful as Dr Marshall’s info and I find with any ‘system’ on the psycho-emotional or psycho-spiritual perspective sometimes they hit the target and you just know it, sometimes you need to sit with it for a bit and sometimes they just don’t ring true for you. 

We are all nuanced individuals after all and who knows what other unseen and lesser understood causal reasons have gone into the cocktail that produces our experience.  

The main thing I took from this experience of concussion was that your healing depends on how you are viewing the situation and the level of self-care you are prepared to commit to. For me, the injury provided much needed time to reflect on the direction my life was taking, my values and what I really needed to shift my focus towards. I was able to give myself what I needed to heal and believe I would.