There’s about to be some more candid talk about IBS and things, as I think the title suggests. If that makes you uncomfortable, go with your gods.

Before I was diagnosed with this brain tumor, I would meditate to deal with the pain. I’d imagine—and maybe I’m showing my age here—a game of pong being played in my neck. Every time a pain signal went traveling to or from my brain, I’d reject the little ball of hurt and send it back down to the bowels of hell.

I was really good at that meditation because with my struggle for the right diagnosis, I had to be. It was very effective. Too effective. 

In fact after a few years, I didn’t need to do it anymore. I managed to put up a permanent barrier to the pain without really understanding what I’d done. And so when the pain came, it wasn’t processed, it was deflected. To my neck, my shoulders, my GI tract where, as you know, it has wreaked all kinds of havoc.

Somewhat serendipitously, I recalled these meditations, and wondered if constructing the pain barrier was part of my problem. I imagined tearing down the wall, fearlessly letting pain signals break through but also letting blood and oxygen circulate as they should.

I visualized my breath running from the top of my head to the tips of my toes.

Holy fuck, you guys.

I immediately had the sensation that my brain was connected to my tumor that was connected to my guts that was connected to my brain that was connected to my head that was connected to my feet that was connected to my muscles…

You get the idea. I felt whole instead of just possessing a bunch of disconnected parts. Without self-awareness, RAIN, and mindfulness (thank you Tara Brach and Dr. Jud) I might not have recognized what was happening.

“I am not scared of you, Pain,” I found myself thinking. Then in my best Pat Bentar, I belted, “Hit me with your best shot. Fire away!”

There have been a number of physical improvements to go with my mental ease. For instance, during yesterday’s MRI, I had a couple of moments where my shoulders relaxed. I yawned on the ride home from the hospital, and at home I farted into the toilet bowl so loud and long and resonantly that Dan giggled like a twelve year old from the bedroom.

My parasympathetic nervous system is still in there!

My colon has always known how to digest y’all. It just wasn’t getting the go-ahead from my brain because I had diverted it’s power and asked it to process my pain and fear instead. A couple of things it has no clue how to do.

It was like I’d been asking a penis how to insert a tampon when a vagina was right there.

To be continued…