You know how some people are more accident prone than others?
Whether those people are clumsy, or things simply happen to them.
Let me tell you a story: Are you sitting comfortably? Then I’ll begin….
There was once a little girl. It must have been before she started wearing glasses because she didn’t remember them breaking, which would have cut her face.
It was after school and she was in the playground waiting for the neighbour with whom they shared the school run to pick them up. She noticed that her shoelaces had come undone, so she knelt down to do them up, she was very proud that she could do that now 😊
This meant that both her hands were by her feet, and she couldn’t put her hands out to save her when two boys chasing each other tripped over her.
Smash went her face into the tarmac of the playground!
She still remembers the blood pouring down her face and dripping onto her summer dress.
She remembers lying in her bed feeling sick – it was sunny outside yet the curtains were drawn.
And then some later, she started to get headaches, which got worse and worse.
You know those headaches – the red-hot pokers through your eyes out the back of the head job?
They all became joined up and just became one big long headache. Wearing glasses didn’t seem to make a difference one way or the other.
Lots of doctors, lots of tests, eventually when she was eight years old, they said – “She’s highly strung, she has migraine. Here, take these tablets. 2 a day.”
And they did help 😊, but by the time she was 13 she was on 6 a day.
At her secondary school, there was the chance to see a doctor to get a 2nd opinion.
She and her Older Mum were sitting in the queue waiting to see the doctor. There was a girl from her class with her mother, also an Older Mum, and the mums got talking about why their daughters needed to see the doctor.
No.2 Mum asked – “Has your daughter ever been in an accident involving her head?”
No.1 Mum replied – “No I don’t think so…. Oh yes!” She gasped as she remembered the playground fall.
No.2 Mum explained that she was a mature student at the British School of Osteopathy, in her 3rd year, and that maybe she could have a look and see if she could find anything that osteopathy might be able to help.
The next week she did, and recommended that No.1 Mum took her daughter to an experienced osteopath in a nearby town who would probably be able to help.
This osteopath was one of the first British osteopaths to go to America to study cranial osteopathy, which he did as well as the more structural ‘cracking’ approach.
He had a listen – both with his ears and eyes as he took the case history, and then with his hands and eyes, as he examined her head and neck and had a feel and a listen to her bones.
He explained that the girl had had an undiagnosed whiplash for the last 7 years! And that her forehead was dented all the way across – plus the underlying movement that cranial osteopaths work with and treat had got completely jammed. No wonder the headaches had been so intense.
“With a bit of luck and a following wind he said I can get you 60-70% better, maybe 80%. I think you will always be prone to headaches because you’ve had this such a long time, and from such a young age.
And try not to have any more accidents!”
***
Even after that very first session, I remember how I turned to my mother and said –
“This, I can live with. Already it feels lighter, it feels different.”
And that is the story of how I first met osteopathy – and how it changed me.
I hope I will have the chance to change your life for the better too.