I’m Back, Bitches!

(I know I said I was giving up and decommissioning this blog, but you didn’t really believe me… did you? You didn’t think I wouldn’t find my way back to running… did you?)

You were a runner. You might not have been fast, but running was always where you went to find your balance and sanity. Running was the invisible tape that was holding your house-of-cards life together. Until you were injured and running was no longer an option. Now you’re just lost, 20 pounds heavier, miserable, with a heart full of resentment at the running mates who went on like you never started with them.

That is where we left me when I closed this blog and receded into depression. And it was a dark sea where old monsters came up from the depths to bite at me without my life raft. Paired with real life stress and lingering pandemic life and all that, simply put, just a mess.

But I am a stubborn bitch. I spent disproportionate chunks of my life miserable, and I was not returning to discontentment if I have any control over the situation. I was not going to let a little tear in my lip unravel my life (because even just typing it is ridiculous). I searched for an alternative. I tried other cardio (as pandemic restrictions would allow), but nothing got me the float, high, or balance I was after.

When I got to the point of looking into machines to facilitate or simulate running, I discovered the ElliptiGO. Rather than shackle myself to a stationary elliptical in front of a screen in my house (which I did after having my first child), the ElliptiGO is a bike that allows me ride to outside, even down some of my old running routes.

I researched (obsessively) and test rode and saved and ordered and waited for restock. I finally got my ElliptiGO in the mail one month ago, four months after giving up running.

It is truly a bizarre-looking contraption. It almost looks like a bike yet with the rider lifted high, pedalling and pumping with no seat. When my children ride behind me, they say, “you look like you’re running on the air!”

I have not ridden a bike since I was perhaps a teenager. I hate them, mostly due to the seat. Hence why I adamantly rejected the idea and mere suggestion of replacing running with cycling. Yet that made my learning curve a bit steeper.

The ElliptiGO is not difficult to ride, though it is challenging to mount and get going. There is hopping and wobbling involved. My first week resulted in A LOT of bruises.

My first ride was intoxicating and terrifying. Due to my lack of cycling experience, the speed and riding in traffic were extremely unnerving. Yet both of those things paired with how high I rode on the ElliptiGO was frightening at first. My hands clutched the handlebars to white knuckle on my first ride, and toward the end, I had to dismount because my adrenaline was raging.

Yet I acclimated quickly. Each ride became more familiar. The fear was steadily replaced by comfort and enjoyment. Once I wasn’t worried about falling or being hit by a car, I could focus on how much it did feel like running, how my heart pounded in my chest and my mind utterly cleared.

I had to relearn things. I had to remind myself how to breath when “running”. I had to learn how to gauge my new speed. I had to find trails that would not make me an asshole to charge down on a bike.

Yet, almost immediately, there I was: back to “running”. After enough miles, on a long enough stretch, pumping my legs hard enough, I forget about the bike beneath me. Hell, I forget my body entirely. I am simply running. It is a float I know all too well.

I start out thinking the run (ride) is too easy and not going to be long enough; then I actually start to feel it, hate my life, and question all my life decisions; then I think I won’t be able to make it; then I want to die; then I hit that float; then I sprint to euphoria and the high on the other side when I’m done. It is running…on wheels.

And my hip does not object. (I don’t want to jinx it but) my hip feels better than it has since the pain resurfaced last summer. I can ride hard for over an hour, and my hip reacts as if I have been lounging on the couch all morning. The impact-less movement actually seems to have helped. I had more pain and stiffness before I got the ElliptiGO, even with dancing and stretching.

This might be a trap (I trust nothing when it comes to this injury anymore), but it seems like I have found my replacement. My hip feels better; my head feels better. I can function again physically and mentally. Fragile balance restored.

So beyond saying “I’m back, bitches!” here are the answers to some of the questions I keep getting about my weird little contraption.

ElliptiGO Q&A

Is it like running?

Surprisingly, it is EXACTLY like running. Once all the bike-ness becomes comfortable, the experience is running, enabled by the machine. I can now “run” much faster and farther than I ever could on my own feet. My hip and body are are also significantly less sore without all the impact.

Is it like riding a bike?

It does not share the bike riding characteristics I hate. Read: the seat. However, the handlebars and steering are very similar. Also, street riding and all traffic rules are the same as bike riding.

Is it scary?

I was terrified at first, mostly by the height. The speed and the unfamiliarity of road riding were amplified by also being so high in the air. Yet most of the fright was due to the newness and faded as the experience wore grooves in my mind.

Is it hard?

In my limited experience, it depends on the ride. You absolutely can make it difficult and rigorous exercise. I would say that versus running, going uphill is more challenging because you must also propel the weight of the bike uphill and fight the wheels wanting to roll downhill. Yet conversely, downhill is infinitely easier as you can just coast and let the bike do the work.

Do you cheat and coast?

Fuck yeah, I do. I suffered to get here. Not only did I pump my legs to heave myself and the device up the hill, I went through injury and pain and suffering and hopelessness and frustration to find my place back on the trail. So I let the wind whip through my helmet at a speed my body is not at all accustomed to and I smile for that brief second.

Do people look at you funny?

Yes! I might as well be riding a unicycle down the road for how strangely people stare at me.

Have you almost been hit by a car?

In my single month, I have had a couple close calls already. I also narrowly missed clipping a pedestrian.

Christina Bergling

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Cheyenne Mountain

My last substantial hike was Barr Trail last October. Before that, it was when I got altitude sickness between Mt Cameron and Mt Lincoln on the Decalibron loop. So realistically, it has been almost a year and a hip surgery since I last really hiked. Over the weekend, I finally returned to a challenging trail.

When my husband decided he wanted to start traversing the Colorado 14ers, we began with Pikes Peak, the mountain that greeted us at the end of our street every day. When we returned to hiking after my surgery, we chose another in our backyard, another in which we are always in the shadow. Cheyenne Mountain.

Cheyenne Mountain is not a 14er. At what we assume was the summit of the hike, we were only a little above 9600 feet. However, the trail is rated difficult to extreme on several sites and by the trail signs on the route.

Knowing the length of the hike ahead (and how slow we go on the upper portion of a 14er), we began at 5am when Cheyenne Mountain State Park opens.

The trail to Cheyenne Mountain begins counterintuitively. Not that we could see much of it with our headlamps. We started on the Talon trail, which wanders in serpentine lazily through the meadow in Cheyenne Mountain Park. Instead of moving directly toward the base of the dark mountain with the twinkling towers of NORAD on top, the path lead us out in the grass, looping us to approach the mountain from the south.

As we moved through the valley, the air alternated between frigid and warm pockets. We listened to the helicopters wandering the sky from nearby Fort Carson. The trail is flat for the majority of Talon. When we turned onto Talon North, we finally saw some incline. Though it remained gentle. We slowly climbed to look down on the city and the sunrise.

By the time we were in full daylight, we reached the Dixon trail that would take us up the side of Cheyenne Mountain. In the light, we discovered that the trails are very well marked, with colored signs and distances. In the valley, there are even trail map signs at all intersections.

Once we began to climb, it felt like real hiking. However, it took over 3 miles to just reach the Dixon trail. From hiking Mt Harvard, we knew that a long, steady return hike can be even more daunting than a steep one.

The Dixon trail was touted as the challenging portion of the ascent. The trail wound us up the rolling hills that steadily climb towards Cheyenne Mountain from the south. We could still hear the helicopters and Reveille call from Fort Carson, but those were the only sounds besides our footfalls and chatter. The trail was peacefully vacant.

The views became more picturesque with each switchback. Colorado Springs sprawled out below us as we climbed higher on the side of the mountain.

We began to successively summit each small hill and see the western face of the range. Then the trail would alternate back to the eastern face and city views again.

Dixon trail is relatively mild for the first few miles. I would liken it to Barr Trail south of Barr Camp. It definitely reminded me of Barr Trail south of the Incline multiple times, which makes sense considering it overlooks the same city. After 2.5 miles, the trail changes, and bikes and horses are no longer permitted. It becomes “extreme.”

Past this sign, the mild ascent of the groomed dirt trail transitions into steeper grade peppered with rock staircases. The articles I had read on the trail before made it sound extremely challenging if not perilous. I would not agree. While the grade was intense and I had to take a few breathers, I would not liken it to anything I have seen past treeline. Perhaps the extra oxygen helped. It also did not last terribly long. When we broke into the aspen meadow, I turned to my hiking mates and said, “was that it?”

The top of Dixon opens into an unexpected field. The grass (and spiny thistles) tickled at my shoulders. Here, the trail is not exceptionally worn. If not for the constant stakes and flags (often tied to clumps of grass), it would be easy to think it was not even a trail at all. Barely into the meadow is the famed plane crash from 1957.

We did not know what to expect from the plane crash. After being on the mountain for so long, we did not know how much would remain. On the one hand, some 60 years later, it is surprising any of the wreckage remained. On the other, it is a fresh trail for dedicated hikers, so perhaps there should have been more left undisturbed. Even though the remains were small, it was still interesting to examine up close. We could pick out debris among the vegetation for a good distance as we continued to hike.

Among the aspens, we intersected the Mountain Loop trail. This pleasant walk would bring us to our destination.

We wandered through the sprawling field then among the aspen trees with massive trunks. Their roots pressed up through the dirt of the trail, revealing the network between the entire forest. We were spoiled by the laziness of the trail, such a contrast to the brief steep section we had just completed.

The Mountain Loop is only a mile and a half. After another section of incline and expansive views, we found ourselves at the top.

Locating the top was more challenging than on a 14er. Past treeline, identifying the summit is simple. It is also usually littered with cardboard signs for selfies. We settled on one rock formation before continuing on to locate what we believe was Robber’s Roost. It was as close as we could get to the antennae farm of NORAD without going off the edge or over a fence. So we called that our summit.

After staring at the red, blinking antennae atop NORAD my entire life, it was surreal to see them from an entirely new perspective. They actually looked small once we were so close.

Since the ascent was significantly easier than we had anticipated from our research, we decided to add the Dragon’s Backbone to our descent.

On the Dragon’s backbone, we found the challenge we had been expecting from the extreme rating. We also found even more spectacular views.

The trail began similar to its intersecting counterparts at first, wandering along toward the ridge. After some clear views from the perceived safety of enclosing rocks and trees, the trail becomes much more technical. Despite the clear trail markings and cairns, we still managed to deviate from the path several times and almost crawl across the face of the crags.

The trail narrows, becomes entirely large rock stairs and drops. The trees and surrounding rocks recede so that the path is like walking along a backbone, with one side as the steep fall off the side of the mountain. Navigating it got the heart pumping for multiple reasons. Even at less than a mile, it was the longest part of our journey.

The Dragon’s Backbone dumped us back into the aspen field, and we began our long descent. Aside from the backbone, none of the trails were hard to come down. It was more the relentless accumulation of the miles. The sun baked down on us once we left the trees on the steep park of Dixon. By the time we reached Talon, we and our bodies were just over it.

The hike was no longer challenging, but the last 3-5 miles just dragged on. Our feet hurt. Our legs were tired. Our back were knotted. We were just done.

That feeling lifted when we reached the car and the 16.5 miles were behind us. We were relieved to discover the hike only recorded at 16 miles rather than the forecasted 18.  Another two miles may have pushed any of us over the line.

Cheyenne Mountain is a beautiful hike. Long but much easier than advertised, if you are accustomed to gauging by 14ers and all the suck that exists past treeline. With all the hype of finally being able to summit this famed and familiar mountain, I was surprised to find the trail largely vacant. We encountered one other group of hikers past where Dixon gets extreme, and we only encountered a handful of people in Cheyenne Mountain Park itself.

Perhaps traffic will increase the longer the full trail is open. Mountain Loop could definitely use some foot traffic to fully establish the trail through the field.

It felt good to be back on the trail, and Cheyenne Mountain was the perfect place to start. I love walking to my car, looking west, and thinking, “I was up there.” Just like I do for Pikes Peak. I have now pointed out Dragon’s Backbone to my kids.

If you want to try Cheyenne Mountain, this article on Springs Magazine gave us flawless directions.

This year will ultimately be largely an off year for hiking for me. We are going to descend Pikes Peak (I’m so excited; I love downhill) in a couple weeks, but I don’t know if we will tackle any new 14ers before the fall snows descend. It may just be something we return to next year, more healed and better planned.

Christina Bergling

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Happy 3rd Anniversary

Happy 3rd anniversary, hip/hamstring injury!

Three years ago this morning, I stepped out of a dance class and began doing an extra stretch sequence. I slid my left leg forward into a front splits and was surprised at how effortless it felt compared to the previous time. I was startled to find myself in full splits, seated all the way on the ground. I smirked in my own pride, finally able to lift my hands from supporting me on the floor. I took a deep, satisfied breath and felt my muscles release a little more.

And my hip half dislocated from its socket.

My leg that was sitting flat on the floor managed to fall lower, in an alarming snapping motion. I was not sure what had happened; I just knew it hurt. The pain seized me. I hovered in some awkward calm over my panic. I just kept thinking to myself, This is really bad. I think this is really bad…

As the past three years have shown, it was really bad.

I would eventually learn that as my hip rolled out from its joint, it tore the labrum along the socket and also 20% of my hamstring in the center. I would go through two orthopedic doctors, multiple medications, multiple steroid and PRP injections, and eventually laparoscopic hip surgery.

And here I am, three years later, eight months after surgery.

I often think back to that moment three years ago, when I lifted my hands and felt my muscles relax. I meditate on how that split second has rippled out, how much that inane decision has affected everything. And how much that is like everything in life.

Every decision is a fork in the road. Every decision is irreversible.

Deciding to stretch gave me years of debilitating pain, pain I have not even completely shaken yet. It is something I would have never expected, but isn’t that like so many decisions that change everything?

So, my injury becomes like all other life-altering decisions for me, intended and unexpected. It fades into my shadow as a formative mark on my timeline. The only thing I can do is accept the reality and the trajectory of the journey.

I do not plan on taking any more measures for this injury. Some pain still lingers, but none of the options for dealing with it are favorable. Instead, I am just experimenting with exercise to decode what aggravates it. I don’t want to do more injections, and I will not have additional surgery (especially the hamstring one), so there is no point in continuing with an orthopedic or getting another MRI. Physical therapy might be beneficial, but I have exhausted my insurance coverage for the year.

That leaves me here, three years later, nodding a cheers to the past and moving the hell on.

Christina Bergling

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12 Weeks Later

Honestly, I don’t know what the hell is going on.

My 12 week post-op appointment was last week. At that point, I was feeling great, healed even. I was experiencing little pain, just hamstring aches that were improving, and thought it might be what recovered felt like.

I was supposed to see my surgeon, but instead, his PA greeted me again. This was fine, though she was unable to provide any real wisdom or answers on my hamstring pain. She did not seem too acquainted with my file. I didn’t expect her to remember my mediocre case out of her entire patient load, but it would have been nice if she skimmed the highlights before coming in. She examined me and agreed I was healing exceptionally well.

At the end of the appointment, I asked her if I was cleared to run. Without hesitation, she said yes and gave me a plan on how to ease back into it with 1 minute on/1 minute off intervals. I asked very clearly if I still had any restrictions. She said I could not do extreme sports but I could SLOWLY return to any activity.

Naturally, I got home from the doctor, laced up my running shoes, and put in two rough and slow miles of micro intervals.

It felt GREAT! It was slow and awkward and barely a run, but I was out there. I even celebrated by listening to my own audiobook on the miles. My hip got a little tired and achy, but there was no real pain. It felt like I was finally getting back to myself.

The next morning, I went to physical therapist, and my therapist freaked out. He was very nervous about the idea of my running and interrogated me on why I would do that. He said the recovery plan always included waiting 16 weeks (another full month) before any impact, especially running. He resolved to test me out on their anti-gravity treadmill then allow me to continue to follow the doctor’s orders, provided there was no pain.

I haven’t been able to try running again.

The next day, I tweaked my hip. I got a little overzealous dancing, and it hurt. So I stopped. I went to barre for the first time the next day, and it felt fine. It was still a little achy from the previous day. I made modifications and did less. Certain positions aggravated it, so I skipped those. The pain seemed reasonable for getting back into activity and also seemed to be improving.

Then, as advised by physical therapy and as I had been doing frequently the past couple weeks, I spent some time on the massage ball on my hamstring attachment, my hamstrings, and my IT band. I worked it all a little longer than normal, hoping to compensate for tweaking my hip and the new, added activity. Then I stretched it out, like normal.

This made my hip livid. It hurt as bad as it did after I started walking on it after surgery, as bad as it did before surgery. The pain got me out of bed for the first time in weeks.

Cue my panic. I tried to remain calm and rational, but any reemergence of the pain makes me stupid. So I did nothing. No activity. No massage ball. No stretching. The hip still hurt, a lot, but seemed to be improving.

Tonight, I went to my belly dance class. I did not intend to really dance and did sit out or modify the majority of class. I have been attending class since before I could participate again for the social aspect. Mostly, I just stretched. And my hip became angry again. Worse than when I tweaked it. Worse than when I massaged and stretched it. Worse. It got worse.

So, I have no idea what’s going on. Am I supposed to be running or not? Am I recovering or not? Did I hurt it or not? Is stretching the problem? Why does it hurt? Will it ever stop hurting? Will it ever get better? I have no answers. I have had no answers this entire recovery, but now, I have severe pain again.

I can’t go back to the pain all day every day again. I would have preferred no oasis from it. Even dipping a toe back into that misery destroys me. Two and a half years of suffering and desperation and hopelessness surge back over me instantly. I cannot go back there.

I also cannot continue to be inactive. Again, I would have rather not got to taste it again. Having this tease of being able to run (twice) and being able to really dance and go back to barre just to land back here is excruciating. It was all just a tease. My mind is not balanced without exercise. I am not myself without exercise. I have been waiting three months, and it has been rough. The thought of continuing on so stagnant is terrifying, especially since activity now ended in pain.

Or stretching did. Stretching that was fine every week before this.

I don’t know. All I have is the panic. Panic at the idea that surgery didn’t work. Panic at the idea that I hurt myself again. Panic at the idea that my hip might be like this forever. Panic at the idea that I might never ever get to really return to my activities.

Panic is where I am 12 weeks later.

 

Christina Bergling

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Six Weeks Later

Six weeks later, the first phase of my recovery from hip surgery is done. In some ways, it flew by must faster than I expected; in others, it has been brutally slow.

After surgery, it took a good three days to detox from the anesthesia. I did not move from the couch much. I slept a lot. Though I did not take any pain medication because I did not have any pain. Despite the numerous warnings and promises of how miserable recovery would be, I began mine with six days pain free. I didn’t really feel any discomfort until I started moving around.

I did my two weeks in the brace and on the crutches. These were definitely the longest and most irritating days in my recovery so far. I loathed the brace and struggled to keep it on. I also never mastered the crutches.

When pain started with walking on the crutches, I was confused. In a typical case, the patient would wake from surgery and be utterly miserable for several days; then the pain would reduce to an ache as they started moving around. In my case, I woke pain-free for the first time in over two years; then my pain increased as I started to move again. Did that mean the pain was getting worse? Did that mean I was finally aligning with a normal track? I didn’t know. And my doctors and physical therapists didn’t seem to know either since, as always, I’m atypical.

I didn’t let the pain or the crutches stop me. I continued with life and activities as much as I could. The crutches were endlessly inconvenient. I could not carry anything, which is especially challenging as a mother of young children. I moved very slowly, again rough with little kids. I hobbled on through life and physical therapy.

After two weeks, I was liberated. It was near blissful to be free of the brace and the crutches. Again, my pain increased though. It was only a fraction of what I was experiencing pre-surgery, but the pattern was definitely increasing. Yet I still did not know if that was a bad sign. I resolved to just follow the rules and wait.

I also finally got to remove the tape and see my stitches. Then the nurse promptly cut them out. They are tiny little marks that may even vanish in time. Amazing they could do all the repairs to my hip joint through these two small holes.

While I was liberated of the physical restraining devices, I remained held back by multiple movement restrictions. At this point, my brain decided it was an apt time to remind me that I’m still bipolar as fuck. I have managed my cycles effectively for years using routine, exercise, and infrequent therapy. And it has worked. More than I even thought it had been. Once these systems were impeded, I got to fully experience what I have been suppressing.

I knew this was a risk so much so that I made multiple contingency plan to deal with it. I knew my system is what kept the symptoms managed and that when I would not be able to maintain it, I would see some reemergence. Unfortunately, the depression still managed to descend on me before I could enact them.

The prolonged anesthesia detox really derailed me. I planned to focus on writing and tasks and being productive with sedentary tasks. Instead, I experienced some of the deepest depression I have experienced in years.

I surely did not miss it. I was working, mothering, recovering, and I felt like I was drowning. I didn’t want to do anything. I didn’t want to see anyone. Textbook symptoms I know well. It made the holidays a struggle, to feel so weighted and disconnected. I powered through, well I think.

I resigned myself to the suck. I knew I was going to be low. I knew why I was low. I knew I had to ride it out. So I did. I missed out on some festive fun. I ruined some minor moments. Thankfully, it was nothing too traumatic. Mostly because I didn’t resist, and I remained communicative about it.

When I returned to work after the holidays, I was able to snatch at some normalcy. Though I still could not move much, I finally launched into all my productive plans. Working made me feel less worthless. I forced myself back into my new novel (and actually enjoyed the progress I made). I wrote multiple short stories and even some horror poetry. I loaded on the tasks and fixated on them.

And it helped. Even still immobile and devoid of the endorphins I needed, being busy and focused tamed the beast.

The pain also leveled off then began to steadily decrease. My body recovered. I do believe the pain was a large contributor to the depression. Whenever I hurt, the base part of my brain panicked that I was returning to my pre-surgical pain. As that threat dissolved, my control over my mind returned.

As I have reached the six week mark, my movement and activity restrictions have been lifted by degrees.  I can now go for short walks or hikes, belly dance gently, move my hip and stretch however I want, carry moderate weight (read: my four year-old). These minor things make a world of difference. Doing gentle yoga and fully stretching my body was near orgasmic. Dancing , even if it was slow and labored, made me feel like myself.

I am still itching to go for a run or do anything until I hit a sweaty high, but that will come in time.

I am proving challenging for my physical therapists. Atypical, as usual. I hit full mobility effortlessly by my six week check. They cannot seem to provide me stretches that actually stretch me. Especially after they have spent so much time smoothing my hamstring with some bizarre butterknife-like torture device. The exercises also do not challenge me. They don’t hurt; they aren’t hard. Yet I’m not allowed to do more. So we go through the motions with no effort and just wait.

Now, I have six weeks to go. Six weeks until I can run, dance, go back to barre, do whatever the hell I want. If it continues without pain, perhaps it will go even faster than the six weeks I have already pushed through. I’m excited, anxious, but at least waiting is easier with the surge of depression fading behind me.

In the meantime, as a teaser to myself and full activity, Pratique Photography finally edited and released my Pennywise belly dance video. It was nice to see what I was able to do in constant pain so I can plan on what I can do when I’m finally healed. Check it out on YouTube.

 

Christina Bergling

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Hip Arthroscopy Surgery

Two and a half years after a seemingly innocuous stretch turned into a relentless injury, the corrective surgery is finally done.

It has been a long road. To review, in August of 2016 I was stretching after a dance class. I went easily into the splits; then my hip popped out from its socket. When it did, I would later learn, it tore my hamstring about 20% in the center and also tore my labrum. My hip slipped back into socket that night, but the pain continued.

After a lot of pain and no recovery, I sought the help of a doctor. The pain was so constant and unrelenting that it was affecting my personality, particularly my patience with my children. My doctor referred me to an orthopedic. He was awful. He treated me very condescendingly and dismissively, as if I had stubbed my toe and was being overdramatic. His administration of a plasma injection into my hamstring gave me sexual assault flashbacks.

His treatment did nothing to heal my injury or alleviate my pain, so I moved to a new orthopedic doctor. This doctor I loved. With additional plasma injections, we did finally heal my hamstring, but the pain persisted. A second MRI and steroid injections revealed the remaining issue to be the labral tears in my hip joint. We scheduled surgery about 7 months out based on the best timing for my insane schedule.

Leading up to the surgery was its own rollercoaster. I oscillated between rationalizing to myself that I could live with this level of pain and didn’t need surgery and not thinking I would make it until the surgery. A couple successful steroid injections bridged the months effectively, giving me enough relief to function. However, in the final two weeks prior to the procedure, my pain became horrendously inflamed, back to initial injury levels. It even got worse, driving me from my bed at night for the first time.

By the time I was in the hospital gown tethered to my IV, it was too painful to sit for any length of time. I hadn’t slept in over a week because every position sent spires of pain shooting up from my hip. When the anesthesiologist brought me the consent form, I signed it without even a glance. I was so ready for the situation to change. Surgery might be a painful recovery, but at least it would change the pain from this endless circle to a line that progressed in an actual direction.

From my side, the drugs began to climb into my veins, and the world began to float. When they brought me into the operating room, I saw the large, Y-shaped table on which I would be operated. The anesthesiologist said, “Let’s get hammered.” And I was gone.

I had been prepared for Hell when I woke up. I was warned by a friend, by my doctor, by the nurse, by the anesthesiologist that this was an especially painful procedure, that they would basically pull my hip apart to perform it, that often they struggle to manage the pain afterward. I did not wake up to any of that.

I felt the soreness of my punctured muscles and the tenderness of the sutures, yet that was it. I kept waiting for pain to blossom in my hip joint and flare over my nerves, but compared to all the months before of constant firing, it was alarmingly silent. My exceptionally open hips and extreme flexibility got me into this mess; perhaps it spared me the worst part of the solution. I woke to my customary, post-anesthesia tears yet not even in full sobs like usual, and I could barely keep myself conscious, but that was all.

My husband got me home, and I slept. Even in the restrictive hip brace and the squeezing compression devices, I slept and slept and slept. I made up for not sleeping the previous week. The hip pain never surfaced, but neither did I. The anesthesia stayed threaded through me, holding me down in a choking haze. I rode waves of nausea as pain clenched my head until it felt like it might fracture.

I hated the sensation. I hated the pain, but more I hated the haze in my mind, the way conscious seemed to slip through my fingers like water. So I continued to sleep, lost myself in a blur of twisted dreams and nightmares until I actually surfaced.

All told, a couple days with a blurry mind plus a little headache and nausea and no surgical pain is not a bad surgical recovery at all. Sure, the journey is not over, but this is a decent start.

I went to my surgical follow up. The nurse and doctor were both surprised by my complete lack of pain. The nurse didn’t know what to do with me, and the doctor was pretty pleased. I also went to my first physical therapy appointment. My therapist was equally surprised by my lack of pain and the amount of mobility I have. Instead of working up, it sounds like we will be holding me back to allow it to heal.

At my follow up, the doctor walked me through the procedure and pictures. He considered the surgery very successful. He discovered a surprising amount of inflammation in all parts of the hip joint.

He repaired a larger labral tear than he had anticipated.

I also had bone spurs on both the ball and socket part of my joint, so he shaved and smoothed both of those down.

So, my labral tear has been stitched up and anchored down, and my bone spurs have been removed. From here, everything should be gliding smoothly in there.

My doctor told me it would take 6 weeks to recover from the operation. However, the physical therapist said it is a 12-16 week recovery. I’m glad I didn’t know this beforehand. At this point, the surgery is done, so I will just walk the recovery however long it takes.

I can sit in any position (within the post-surgical guidelines) without pain. I can lay flat without pain. I can stand up in one fluid movement without pain. After over two years, all of that is amazing. I can take that relief and stretch it out into patience for getting back to the rest.

I do hate the brace though. And the crutches. They are so slow and so confining. When I have been fully lucid, I feel trapped and suffocated. But it’s only the first two weeks. I can feel the depression and cabin fever creeping around the edges of my mind. I’m going to curl up on the couch and watch endless horror movies and write blogs and work on my novel. I am going to throw up every sedentary distraction I have against the looming inactivity and boredom. I can do this. I can decide to do this and force my mind into line behind me. I can take control of this from my recovery bed.

So, the surgery happened. I lived, and now, I start my recovery.

 

Christina Bergling

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Unfiltered

My mind is an asshole.

I know this. I have known this since I tried to take my life at age 12. I have stepped up and actually dealt with this since I was 19. And yet, somehow it still manages to surprise me with this truth. Over and over again.

Last Saturday, I experienced one of the worst depressive crashes I have had in years. The degree of depression hearkened back to when I had no idea what was going on in my brain in my late teens or when I was learning how to deal with my bipolar in my early twenties or when I was in Iraq a decade ago.

Years ago, I seemed to figure out how to live with my bipolar, how to balance my life and my mind. It took several therapists, years of experimentation and failure. Finally, with a combination of behavior cognitive processing approaches, an amazing support system, a solid routine, and a high amount of exercise, I seemed to find a way to ride the waves, to level out the sea a bit. It has never been a cure, but it has been pretty effective adaptation.

So effective that I had largely forgot to depths my mind could drop to and what it was like to be raw and unfiltered.

Saturday reminded me. After a night writhing in hip pain on the couch, the depression overwhelmed me from below my exhaustion. It weighed down on me to a heavy and paralytic level I had not experienced in so long. I lay on the couch simply weeping for a couple hours. My husband attempted to counsel me, but I didn’t have words, and I did not want to make eye contact.

My husband has been with me through all stages of this journey. He met me when I was a teenager who was cutting and burning herself. We were friends and casual partners when I was lost and self-destructive. We began our actual relationship after I started dealing with what I am. He was who I came home to after Iraq. He has been with me for half of my life, which has included most of my struggles and traumas. He has seen me that low; he knows the patterns.

He dragged me off the couch, put me in my running clothes, and gently guided me out the front door. Even as I protested that I just didn’t want to through tears. He knew I needed to.

So I ran. Through the crippling pain in my hip and in my head. It took a full mile to be able to make full strides with my leg. It took a second mile to feel like I was actually running. But by the third and fourth miles, I was able to float, to lose myself in the run, to not be in me.

The run helped. It didn’t cure me of the depressive episode; it never does. But it did elevate me out of the dark waters so that I was no longer drowning. I was simply numb. I was still struggling to engage, make eye contact, form thoughts that could be turned into speech. I had zero appetite. Food tasted like sand, but I needed to eat in order to drink a Monster energy drink (my long-time bipolar hack).

The Monster helped. It usually does. It lifted me another level out of the darkness. I could finally interact with people again, which was helpful since I had a baby shower to attend. I was functional enough to help host the party and engage with people, all while being completely honest about how I was feeling and what was happening but without stealing the attention. Interaction with people helped too, helped pull me out of myself.

I made it through the cycle. My husband, running, Monster, and my dear friends substantially abbreviated the episode. But the crash revealed what I was really worried about with my upcoming surgery.

I wasn’t really concerned about the medical procedure or the pain. Sure, those are always worries when going under for surgery. However, the real fear, the true anxiety was the idea of losing my balance, not having access to my crutch. I would survive the surgery. I would get through the pain. My body would heal. The prospect of dealing with my bipolar, my mind unfiltered and unmitigated for six weeks is what truly worried me.

I know that 2-3 days without any exercise cause me to cycle. Nothing like the epic crash of Sunday but depression nonetheless. I know that pain and sickness cause me to cycle. This hip injury has been doing that to me for two and a half years. So the idea of being in pain and unable to reset my brain chemistry was somewhat terrifying.

In the end, I’m not scared of surgery or pain; I’m scared of myself. My crash on Saturday reminded me of what I still am and what I might be facing after surgery.

Logically, I know I’ll be fine. This too shall pass. All of that. However, fearing and avoiding facing the full monster inside me is no different that flinching away from a stove after having been burned before. It’s an instinctual avoidance of pain. Getting a taste of that darkness clarified my anxiety. Yet, as terrible as the sample was, it did pass, and that reminded me that even the lowest depression is only temporary.

I’m sure it will be less than I fear; it usually is. Fear is distortion. I know what I need to deal with on the other side of the anesthesia and am being proactive about redirecting my energy during my recovery.

 

(Note: I could not find the artists for the images in this post. If you are or know the artist, please let me know so I can give proper credit.)

Christina Bergling

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Approaching Surgery

Hip surgery is imminent. I went to my preop appointment yesterday in preparation for my hip labrum surgery the first week of December. I signed all the paperwork and went home with the brace I will live in for 2-3 weeks.

Now, it feels real. Part of me wants to just do it and get it over with, get into the pain so I can put it behind me and actually heal. The other part of me does not want to do it at all and is rationalizing how I can live with the pain as it is now.

But, where have I been since altitude sickness on my last 14er? What have I been doing on my way from summer to surgery?

The altitude sickness may have concluded my pursuit of 14er summits for the year; however, it did not end my hiking. Our little group decided to hike half of Pikes Peak in the beginning of October (as opposed to the full summit last year).

We had a magical, euphoric, perfect fall hike. A chilly fog clutched the trail on our ascent to Barr Camp. Then the sun ignited the autumn colors on our descent back down. It was the perfect weather, the perfect distance, the perfect company–simply the perfect hike.

This hike highlighted a very long and successful fitness run for me. I was running regularly, returning to my normal mile pace (slow though it always may be), building up my distances over 6 miles. I was taking multiple barre classes a month and seeing the results. I had returned fully to belly dance and even had begun performing again.

My fitness cadence was exactly as I wanted it. My routine was solid and balanced, and so my mind was solid and balanced in reaction. Honestly, I felt like myself. And I felt pretty fucking happy.

When I hit that blissful point, I knew it was transitory, as it always is. I knew the pendulum was reaching its full extension to one side and would instantly be arching in reverse. It always does. Every time I feel like I have achieved my goal or am where I want, the situation immediately changes. The rug is pulled out, and I fall directly on my ass to start over. That is my cycle; that is the pattern of my life.

In this case, I thought it was because surgery was coming and I would inevitably have to start over after recovery. I was wrong. A debilitating, month-long sinus infection took me entirely by surprise and derailed me just as effectively.

Of course, I tried to fast and run through it and failed exquisitely. The illness finally bent me to its mercy. After three different antibiotics, two different steroids, and so many weeks, I am finally, physically back to more normal. However, all that progress and euphoria and balance evaporated. To reclaim my motivation in the waning window before I go under the knife, I have had to just accept this limitation. I have had to just do what I can.

I did not do that well or gracefully, but I think I have largely made my peace and moved past my frustration. Though being knocked so completely off balance paired with being so annoyingly sick sent my bipolar cycles into overdrive. It had been a while, and I was woefully out of practice, so that was fun for all involved. But again, I think I have regained myself, or at least control of myself.

So, next up, surgery.

At this point, might as well. Maybe it’s easier to go under and jump into the limits of recovery when I’m already below my expectations. Maybe the fall won’t be as far. Or perhaps it’s worse to have squandered these last weeks before I don’t have a choice. Or maybe it sucks either way. I need to just embrace the suck. I need to just do this and get it over with.

I’m not necessarily nervous about the surgery itself. I might have been earlier, but my salpingectomy (Fallopian tube removal) surgery went so smoothly in January that it actually calmed me. I, of course, cried hysterically after anesthesia. I always do. However, that procedure was also laparoscopic, and I healed near effortlessly. I went on a real run in less than 48 hours. I appreciate that was a far more minor procedure and recovery time, but it still gives me somewhat of a preview to pacify my rampant brain.

I dread only the recovery. Not even the pain. I can deal with the pain. I have been for two and a half years for this injury; at least surgery recovery pain might lessen and lead to actual improvement. It is the physical limitation of the surgery. All the ways I went off the rails by having a sinus infection amplified, the removal of my balance and my therapy.

To combat this anxiety, I am proactively choosing to focus on other things. I have scheduled lazy time with several friends. I plan to fast hard on the couch, and I plan to pour all my time into my writing (which has unexpectedly been neglected for the fast two months).

Until then though… I’m capitalizing on not dying and not being cut open. All the running and all the barre classes. My daughter and I choreographed a horror heavy metal belly dance number I want to get recorded. I am back to cramming as many activities in as possible before spending my holidays relegated to the couch.

Wish me luck! (And expect more frequent posting.)

 

Christina Bergling

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Surgical Options

Now looks like a good time to start over. Again. It seems like I have done nothing but physically start over for the past four years, and (if I’m honest with myself) I think I’m having a small adult tantrum about it.

When I was violently ill through my entire pregnancy, I thought it would get better when it was over. When the birth was rough, I thought it would be fine after I recovered. When recovery stretched out into years, I thought it would normalize eventually. When I pulled my hip, I thought I could run through it and get better. When I tore my hamstring (and apparently my labrum), I thought I would suffer the couple months and be back to normal. When my hamstring finally healed after 18 months and two PRP injections, I thought it might finally be over.

Yet here we are.

Nothing has been debilitating or unbearable, just an endless string of discomfort and inconvenience, of tasting recovery or “normal” just to be shoved back to square one. And perhaps the root of my suffering is the resistance to the idea that this is my new normal, my foolish attachment to how I should be after all these changes.

Maybe this chapter of my life is about a series of physical recoveries, rather than the mental and emotional recoveries in the previous chapter. Maybe life is all just a series of events and recoveries.

Or maybe I’m just whining.

I went to my orthopedic for my steroid injection follow up today. At my previous appointment, they injected steroids into my hip joint to troubleshoot my continued pain. Though my hamstring showed healed, the pain continued as an unusual presentation for a labral tear. The shot helped. A lot. For about a week before its effectiveness started to fade.

Since the shot seemed to indicate the root of the pain, we discussed options. I could do nothing and live with the current discomfort level. I could do maintenance steroid injections until they lost effectiveness. I could do PRP or stem cells to stimulate healing, despite the lack of evidence that the labrum can heal itself. Or I could have laparoscopic surgery.

I found myself torn between the extremes, as always. Nothing or surgery.

Typing it out, my logic does not make any sense, but my instinct was to do nothing. To just continue to deal with it. It seems ridiculous after lamenting the issue for nearly the past two years. It seems like it should be an easy answer to finally fix it. Yet it was the idea of recovery that tempted me to stay with the pain. Though I am known to develop Stockholm Syndrome type attachment to my pain.

I didn’t want to face another lapse, another step back after it took this long to regain this ground, after how many times I already had to retread. Spoiled complaints of the mostly functional. Yet beneath that is the fear.

Exercise and endorphins are the foundation of my precarious little balance on life. It sounds silly to say that two weeks on crutches could be unbearable, but… I know that if I don’t exercise hard enough in 2-3 days, the depression starts to swell and my thoughts begin to twist and contort. I know that it’s just one step back towards that darkness. So the idea unnerves me, and my self-preserving instinct is to just not. To just run through it.

Truthfully, I still want to do that now. Just keep running and tell myself the nerves will give up.

More superficially, I am frustrated to release the progress I’ve made. I’m reluctant to go back to adding miles and shaving off seconds, to rebuilding the muscles and conditioning that abandon me so immediately. I finally got back to where I thought I left. I even just said, foolishly aloud, that I was finally almost there so it must be time for something to send me backward.

With this injury, the universe takes what I say way too fucking literally.

However, after being scolded by at least three people, I know that all of this is my stupid, irrational fear and obsessions clouding an easy and obvious decision.

So, next step, surgery…

 

Christina Bergling

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Healed

It has been a while since I posted! Honestly, I was exhausted of posting the same thing (plus I was painfully busy). Trying and failing to lose weight. Trying and failing to recover from my hamstring injury. The same circle for over a year and a half. It had to be as mundane to read as it was frustrating to endure.

However, I can finally say with some measure of confidence that I have progress on both fronts!

Following my latest PRP injection several weeks ago, I returned to my orthopedic for a follow up. While my injury was definitely improved, the pain lingered. My doctor offered further injections, but I requested an updated MRI to see where we were and if any progress was being made. Last week, I had the MRI with additional contrast this time (which I mostly slept through), and today, I got my results.

The MRI revealed that, compared to my previous MRI over a year ago, my left hamstring appears NORMAL. Meaning I have actually healed!

My two hamstrings looked the same on the MRI. All the time and pain and resting and injections have ultimately done something. I had a mini celebration when my doctor told me and then had to struggle to focus on the rest.

So why am I still in pain? The MRI also revealed a tear and some other issues in my labrum. However, I do not present with labral tear symptoms. The pain should be in my groin rather than at my hamstring attachment. So we did a steroid injection into my hip joint as troubleshooting. If it has an effect, it must be an odd presentation of the labral tear. If not, perhaps to physical therapy to work out the last of the pain.

In any case, MY HAMSTRING IS HEALED!

As far as weight is concerned, I think fasting is my answer. I have been fasting (as described in The Obesity Code) since January-ish. I have lost 20 pounds with no rebound. I don’t think or obsess about food. In short, I feel like myself again, physically and mentally.

The fasting suits the binge and purge nature inherited from my eating disorder days but reapplies it in a way that it balances my body’s insulin rather than destroying my mind and body. It just works for me. It is so much simpler and easier than I thought. I am saving a shit ton of money on food, brain power on not having to plan, and soul on not torturing myself by counting the calories in every bite.

FREEDOM!

And it’s working. Slowly and steadily. To the point that I don’t care anymore. I’m just happy.

Some days, the fasts are not easy. Some days, I don’t succeed. But I just let those days fall away and try again the next week. I can have pizza and beer until I’m sated and know that my Monday morning fast will balance me back out.

I think this might be my solution. It was a long and maddening journey to get to both of these points, but I’m happy to finally see them.

PLUS I am running more and faster again. I might even be able to fully get back to that. This is a running blog after all…

Christina Bergling

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