Support Taj's Journey to Pain-Free Living

Hi Beloved Community!

I am humbled and grateful for this opportunity to share my story. I notice how difficult it feels to ask for support, with the resistance of pride (and perhaps shame) hindering my voice. However, I am currently faced with a debilitating lumbar, sacral, and sciatic pain that has prevented me from most ways of working for income and contributing to my home and community over the last month. The experience of pain is taking me beyond pride or shame, and with vulnerability, I am asking for the care that I need.

December was rough. With intense pain in my lower back and pelvis, often with sciatic nerve pain registering at levels of 8, 9, and 10 out of 10 on the spectrum, I have needed assistance with most basic tasks, such as help getting dressed, and for a few weeks found it rare to sleep more than 3 hours in a night. I am re-emerging from a place that has been difficult to share about, having mostly suffered in silence. With limitations, I am doing physio exercises to rebuild pathways and pattern myself for movement again. I understand that I need help from others as well.

For decades, I have navigated different levels of physical discomfort, often concerning my lower back, due to sport-related and fluke injuries, sometimes bringing me to the edge of my wits, but nothing really compares to the last several weeks that have humbled me so relentlessly and profoundly in my physical reality. To be honest, it feels scary to behold what will happen in the future if this does not shift.

It can be challenging to know what support is needed, and that is where I feel incredibly fortunate to have found a chiropractic doctor whose holistic understanding, skillful technique, and careful approach is having a healing impact that feels right to my body and my soul. His understanding, skill, and observation have revealed a predicament of my spinal structure, a severe angle within my vertebrae, from decades of spinal traumas and stress (and perhaps congenitally small vertebral foramen in my lumbar), and how it is currently wreaking havoc within my nervous system and physical capacities.

The doctor has proposed a six-month healing program that includes hands-on treatment three times a week. It feels relieving to reach this stage, where a healing plan resonates at practical and intuitive levels, and yet a major challenge remains... the doctor does not accept insurance, and the cost of this plan is $6582. For now, I need to raise $2700 to continue with this healing plan!

*UPDATE* After 3 weeks of treatment (that I've been able to afford thanks to the generosity of others), I am experiencing a profound shift in the pain level and my mobility. I am feeling relieved that this is working.

The challenge here brings about so much more, now that pain has taken me beyond a fearful resolution to suffer in silence--to face what others may think and feel to behold my physical weakness and my financial limitations. I am being broken open by this pain, and I am grateful for so much already--I am touched so deeply by the care of others, and I find cause to keep going by the primal well of resilience within. This is not something I can do alone, though with a hopefulness offered by my beloved community of family and friends, I am moving through my solitude to find the gift of this experience and rise in reciprocity.

It is my work today to ask for what I need, which is $2700 to continue with the treatment plan to transform the messages of stress and trauma within my spine into ones of health and stability. I am grateful for this opportunity, that I meet with humility, resilience, and compassion, finding resolve to offer these traits forward (with a prayerfully pain-free spine) for the benefit of all, for those of the Great Spirit I may serve in love.

In deep gratitude,

temporary pain,

and infinite love,

Taj