What has your gratitude practice looked like since you've been sick?
This is a good question. I've been asked this over the years because of some other illnesses and neck issues that I've had. I suppose my answer could get me accused of toxic positivity, but I'm tired of letting pop culture concepts keep me from talking about the things that have helped me the most (I’ll tell you why it’s not toxic positivity toward the end though).
I've dealt with chronic pain for over a decade because of herniated and bulging discs in my neck. It's moved down my spine as my lower vertebrae are fusing, and it seems like something is going on with the middle of my back now.
The thing I've learned from this is that pain is just pain. It's your body trying to tell you something is wrong. A surgeon told me that fusing my neck would fix the pain, but it would cost me a lot of mobility. I'm not ready to do that yet. This means that I am choosing pain over a solution that I think is worse than pain.
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