Last summer, I threw my back out. Like “out-out,” as in could not sit or stand or move in any direction without feeling pain.

It was not a delightful time.

Now, I am going to paint a picture for you of how it happened, assuming you promise not to laugh at said picture because it really wasn’t my finest hour. It involved a Pilates reformer (which I thought I had mastered after 2 years of classes and personal training), me on my back, straps on my feet, and legs over my head. (Okay, you can laugh if you want…I can appreciate that this sounds a little indelicate…) I was in a class, proud and confident in my skills and strength, but admittedly a little nervous at the added weight my instructor had suggested I try that day for this particular exercise, but I felt good. And I felt ready. 

Until I didn’t.

Until I was screaming, “Oh my #$#$*@(&#$ HELP ME!” because my back was also screaming in pain and there I was, legs up and over my head and I could not move. 

It was terrifying.

Now somehow or another I managed to get home that day – it might have been shock that allowed me to manoeuvre the car (thank you, stress hormones!) – and as I sobbed on the phone to a member of my health care team, examining  everything that I had been experiencing in the weeks leading up to and including this incident, I heard myself say the “mic drop” words: “I am so sick of bending over backwards for everybody else!”

There was silence on the other end of the phone. And I exhaled fully into the space that was left after saying what so needed to be said.

It was true: I really had been bending over backwards for a lot of people, just as I had bent over backwards on that Pilates reformer, and most pivotally, I had been bending over backwards for a particular client who, I know now, had no intention of ever meeting me even part way, no matter how far I bent.

And as it happens, I bent so far that I pretty much snapped (aka really, really hurt my back).

I believed then, and still do today, that the incident on the Pilates reformer was not the real injury. The real injury was happening every day, little by little, as I bent and twisted myself to meet the ever-changing, ever-moving goal posts imposed by this client.

And I believe, looking back on it all, that my body was hinting at me long before the Pilates incident that I was nearing a breaking point. 

My night sweats and hot flushes were at an all-time high. My digestion was a mess. And my sleep was interrupted by 3 am wakeups, as if an alarm was going off somewhere. 

But I wasn’t listening to these hints, so my body, wise and determined to alert me to the dangers of my behaviour, found another way to get me to “see” what was happening…and force me to make different choices.

I’ve always been aware that my body is talking to me. This is something I’ve known deeply for as long as I can remember. And yet, sometimes, even knowing that, I ignore it.

And usually, it’s because it’s telling me something I don’t actually want to hear. 

And the reason I don’t actually want to hear it is quite simply that in hearing it, I will be forced to make a change, and the changes that I need to be forced to make – the ones that don’t just happen in the normal flow of life – are hard. 

And this change, the one prompted by the Pilates incident, was really, really hard to make.

It meant letting a client go – one that paid well and had a mission that I was honoured to support. And it meant facing the reality that I had fallen back into an old behaviour pattern of not setting boundaries, not taking care of myself as I worked, and not honouring my own inner knowing that something just wasn’t “right” in that relationship. 

It was not easy, but Steph and I extricated ourselves from that work relationship and with every step, my back felt better and better. It took months for me to heal completely, but I’ve renewed my commitment to my body as a result.

Knowing that my body is talking to me all the time is not the same as listening to what it’s saying…and heeding what is said (no matter how hard it is to do so).

My body is my greatest ally, my forever-partner-in-life. We, my body and I, are quite literally inseparable until death do us part. So, listening to it – really listening – every darn day and in every single moment feels like a pretty smart move to me. One I hope that you might make, too.

You can find more from Rebecca at Plaid For Women or connect with her on her website.