Your Health is Your Wealth

I can remember it like yesterday, the day I discovered the meaning of ‘your health is your wealth’.

On 29th December 2022 I arrived in Manual Antonia, the coastal town with a rainforest backdrop. My base to what should have been an idyllic few days, my final days of a dream 2 week trip in Costa Rica.

Less than 24 hours later I would be whimpering in pain, my body in shock and my mind whispering, ‘I’m not sure how you survived that’.

Slowly realising the impact my body endured from a very scary surf accident as each minute passed. An experience I will remember for a long time, maybe a lifetime. It, literally, left its mark as I flew back to Scotland across two flights with two black eyes. Not how I envisaged 2022 to end, or even start a new year.

It still feels like it wasn’t real, as if I was part of a movie. What a ride life is.

“What exactly happened?”, I hear you mutter.

Mother Nature taught me a lesson. A life lesson I still don’t know the true meaning of, but it has left an impression. One where you catch yourself whispering, ‘Things could have ended very differently’ as you catch your breath as you experience a flashback.

Now I am out of the darkness and can think of my future, the biggest impact so far is exactly that, that I have a future. A second chance at life. So many other people don’t survive a near miss, they are gone – not here to reflect and learn, to leap back into life. I felt I danced with mother nature, and the outcome – I cheated death.

Now back in Glasgow, 7 months have passed. I still have moments where I stop and gasp. I recall what happened, second by second and gulp. A very real awareness of the severity of the accident, and the fragility of life.

I was reminded how precious life is when a young French female cyclist was killed in an accident in Glasgow, she died on impact having crashed with a lorry. I’ve cycled that same route lots of times, not a care in the world. I drove past some flowers on the roadside after I ran a 5km race nearby at Glasgow Green. The post-race endorphins flooded through my body. I felt a shudder as I realised the flowers were exactly where she was taken, left as a memorial.

A 22 year old from Paris, who had made Glasgow home. Now gone.

Makes you stop and ponder. Appreciate you have another day, to experience more from life.

Shortly before my trip to Costa Rica, I was cycling home from a nail appointment. Again, not a care in the world. It was dark on a Friday night. The streets were busy with nighttime traffic, and the pavements buzzing with those seeking some festive fun.

Suddenly from nowhere, I felt a feeling, a feeling that is hard to explain, one where it felt like someone had grabbed a remote control and slowed down life, everything in front and around me slowed down, and my thoughts became crystal clear. An appreciation there was very little I could do as I spotted a car about to pull out exactly where I was cycling into.

It still gives me goosebumps thinking of it now.

I had no time to consider my options. All I knew was I had to cycle hard to get out of its way and hold my breath waiting for the impact, hoping it wouldn’t happen. The impact, thankfully, never came. Just at the moment, I expected the impact, the driver slammed on the brakes. Talk about lucky.

As I cycled home, riding on adrenaline, muttering ‘That was a close call’, I felt a sense of relief. My body and life were still in my hands. Days later I arrived in Costa Rica, country number 96.

Life is full of sliding door moments, and near misses, that we ourselves fail to see, distracted, unaware we are not in complete control of our destiny. Strolling around acting like we have all the time in the world., but our future and health aren’t guaranteed.

I was soon to experience that feeling again. That feeling where your life slows down and you are waiting for the impact. This time it came, oh it came, and I was fully conscious to feel it. It is hard to fully think back to the impact moment in Costa Rica as it is a little terrifying. It feels surreal like I’m watching myself in a movie. Detached from reality, looking down on the version of me who experienced it.

Back in April, while eating my breakfast muesli during my holiday in Ibiza, I heard a voice speak up from within, it declared, to myself, to my mind, ‘If you fell unconscious after the impact in the water you’d have drowned’. I nodded in agreement as I spooned more muesli into my mouth, thinking back to that day. I also felt the anxiety sit in my tummy until I reframed the thought by explaining, ‘I am safe, I am here, we are ok’, and felt it float away.

I’m not here to be stuck in December.

Back in December I’d grabbed a surfboard and entered the sea, something I’ve done before in Sir Lanka, Madeira and Portugal. Looking back the waves were strong and short, I wasn’t confident in myself or the setting. The skies were cloudy, there was an edgy feeling about the whole morning. Hard to explain but I felt it.

For anyone that hasn’t surfed it is a very frustrating activity, one where you are waiting a lot for the right wave, or you are misjudging the wave and nose-diving into the sea, dragging yourself up from the seabed and back out to the waves. It is intense. That morning it felt like a struggle, I was not overly enjoying it, but also know that for all the frustration, there can be great ecstasy when you catch a wave. Therefore I kept dragging myself back out.

Very soon I found myself eyeing down a massive wave. A wave I had no intention of surfing, but also knew I couldn’t swim away from it or through. I felt trapped by the sea.

I had no time to decide what to do as I soon found myself, literally, inside the wave. A massive wave. I was swirling around it like inside a washing period. I was so disoriented, a feeling of doom flooded me as I could sense this wasn’t going to be my day. Quickly the wave lost its control over me, and dropped my body headfirst onto the sea bed, which for reference felt like concrete. My forehead slammed off it. I will forever remember that feeling. The intense force of the concrete seabed rippled through my forehead, through my neck, and down the right side of my upper body. As I swirled around the seabed I gasped, internally. I knew I was alive, my body felt in one piece, but I knew I had to get out of the water.  My mind was screaming, ‘We are in danger’.

As I walked out of the sea I knew I was alive, which sounds strange, of course I was alive, but I felt dead. Like a ghost. I looked around to make eye contact with someone to 100% confirm I was alive. Ahh, the shock. I looked like me, but inside I was petrified. You know when something happens in life and you look around as you walk away unscathed. I felt like a ton of bricks had been thrown at my body, and my body had shut down to protect itself.

The following minutes and moments felt precious. When the shock started to wear off everything felt strange, I was left with a body that didn’t feel like mine. The only way I can explain it was my right hand, arm, and neck felt properly damaged. It was crying out in pain.

My neck felt stuck, my shoulders shocked up to my ears and my shoulder blades on fire. It didn’t feel as though my shoulder blades could carry my body. I wanted to cry, but I had no tears to release. Survival mode on, my emotions shut down, the threat of danger still felt real. The world, and my senses, felt like it had slowed down. I was living minute by minute,

I was struggling to do life, focusing on my breathing. Inside I was flooded with panic, coming up for air, before suddenly drowning again. Drowning in the unknown and uncertain times. My thoughts on loop, ‘When will I be back to normal?’, ‘What was around the corner?’, ‘What should I be doing to make it better or not doing to make it worse?’, and the biggie, ‘I need to fly home in two days’.

The next day arrived, New Year’s Eve. As I reluctantly glanced at the mirror, thankful to see the bruising on my forehead had subsided. And in its place, the beginning of two black eyes. Appearing slowly, with a weary welcome, I knew it meant the impact of the accident was moving through my body. 

That evening I sat at the end of the dinner table at the local ‘place to be’ restaurant, surrounded by my tour group. It looked like I was there, but my mind was gone. Wondering around my wild, anxious thoughts. Feeling my body clench and stubbornly ache. A signal it was struggling to ‘be normal’. To hold me. My focus was small, appreciating everything my body could still do as I adjusted to life with pain, flooding me at any moment.

The next day passed in a flash, and I was soon manoeuvring two flights back to Scotland. Oh, how I wanted to be home. Naively I thought I would magically feel better as I landed on home soil. It was really the start of my recovery and a tough start to 2023.

On return to Scotland, I scurried to my physio with my two black eyes in tow and a body that felt so delicate that it might snap in two, or ten pieces. He glanced at me. As I glanced back, I took a deep breath and started to explain my injury. 45 mins later he sent me off on my way wishing me luck in London, where I was meant to be running the marathon in 12 weeks. I looked back gobsmacked thinking my physio was from a different planet. I was struggling to do life, there was no way I could run London.

As he explained I wasn’t broken I took solace in this information. Unfortunately, when you aren’t broken but feel broken, you know there is more to unravel.

With an awareness that life and my body are fragile, and had likely, subconsciously, shut down my body to protect it, I had stiffened my neck and shoulders to protect it from perceived danger.

This is when I realised the power of the mind, and my journey into the mind–body connection commenced. A journey that was only the beginning. How much of the pain was amplified by my mind? was my body storing the trauma?

As I stepped out into the sunshine I knew I would need to work on my future, to find my health, and regain control of my body.

I had a lot of work in front of me, I just didn’t realise how much. I knew that I wasn’t going to live a life flooded with pain. I just had to figure out how to control the thoughts in my mind, as I had a feeling they were contributing.

I knew deep down this wasn’t how my story would end, I had the pen to write the next chapter.

I’m eager to share everything I have learned about the mind-body connection through my recovery. It is ongoing but very powerful. And yes, I ran London. Maybe my physio wasn’t from another planet after all.

Lots more to come.

Learn to read symptoms not only as problems to be overcome but as messages to be heeded.”
― Gabor Maté,