Category Archives: Physical limitations

Never, never, never give up

Eighteen years ago Lesley was assistant director of student affairs for the Cal State University chancellor’s office. She left work a bit early for a family gathering. She never showed up. Her car had been broadsided by another driver after a hit-and-run driver set her car spinning into traffic.

Lesley uses a strap to keep her arms elevated and a wall for a bit of extra support as she does a wheelchair version of jathara parivartanasana.

Lesley uses a strap to keep her arms elevated and a wall for a bit of extra support as she does a wheelchair version of jathara parivartanasana.

By the time her family found her unconscious in a hospital hours later, doctors told them she would never survive and even if she did, she had suffered such severe brain damage she would be a vegetable.

She told me her story a few months after she began coming to my yoga class in 2012. A Dial-A-Ride bus drops her off more or less in time for class, and she rolls in with a motorized wheelchair, always dressed to the nines.  She came the first time at the urging of a friend who knows how much more yoga is than physical movement. She came the first time, hesitant, unsure how it might all work out.

I wasn’t sure she would be back, she seemed so sad.  Her friend assured me, though, that Lesley had loved the class.

In fact, Lesley has become a regular. The brain stem damage has left her with little control of the left side of her body. The muscles have become very tight from disuse. Even the right side is tight after years spent in a wheelchair. She says she started yoga to try a form of physical movement she could enjoy.

Lesley uses the back of a chair open her front and side chest and to stretch her shoulders.

Lesley uses the back of a chair open her front and side chest and to stretch her shoulders.

We keep working on variations on poses. Bharadvajasana, a seated twist, gets extra power with the help of a wall. A wall helps her bring her arms upward into urdhva hastasana, from there she can gaze upward. A strap can help her extend her arms out to the side. A chair in front helps her into a version of child’s pose. Her chair back can recline back somewhat, and a mat rolled up behind her spine helps lift her chest. For garudasana, eagle pose, she entwines arms and legs.

I pick poses that might help lift her chest and so lift her mood, or that might get the left and right sides of body and brain cooperating.

It was when she came to a pranayama workshop that I learned why she was so sad. She had never seemed like someone who felt sorry for herself. It turns out she felt such sorrow for her husband, that he had to take care of her.

I know, though, that he must take strength from her beauty of spirit. It is so evident.

A sticky mat rolled up behind her spine, Lesley works on a version of upward arms in supine mountain pose.

A sticky mat rolled up behind her spine, Lesley works on a version of upward arms in supine mountain pose.

The pranayama workshop also helped Lesley figure something out. As she learned more about the spiritual and philosophical aspects of yoga that day, she said, “I realized that God was letting me know this was where I was meant to be.”

No more excuses

Students here range in age from 42 to 82. One is blind. One is a guy. One has fibromyalgia. One has post-polio syndrome.

Students here range in age from 42 to 82. One is blind. One is a guy. One has fibromyalgia. One has post-polio syndrome.

Reasons people give saying they can’t do yoga.

I’m too stiff.

–I have arthritis.

–I’m overweight.

–I have a bad back.

–I’m too old.

–I’m a guy.

Let me describe the people in the picture here. 

Their ages range from 42 to 82. One is blind. One has scoliosis and deals with chronic pain from post-polio syndrome. One has fibromyalgia. One’s a guy.

Let me describe their teacher.

I am 54. I took my first yoga class in 1995, shortly after I learned I had advanced osteoarthritis in my left hip. I had been told at age 25 that I had the knees of an 80-year-old. I had my first joint surgery a few months later. It left me more crippled in the knees than before. I had suffered from crippling back pain since I was 18.

By the time I took that first class, I could walk about a quarter mile. I could go up and down stairs only with assistance. I had to use my hands to move my feet onto the gas pedal and brake to drive to that first class. I sat on the floor and burst into tears from the pain. My teacher gave me a stack of towels to sit on and I could stop crying. An hour and 15 minutes later, the back pain was gone.

I began studying how to teach and then began teaching in 1997.  Fifteen months later I had to have that left hip replaced. The doctor told me I would have been there much sooner if it hadn’t been for the yoga. Three months later, I had the second hip replaced. My recovery period: five weeks. At week four after each replacement, I was walking up and down Mt. Rubidoux, a 3.5-mile round trip on a big hill in my hometown. My doctor also attributed that recovery pace to the yoga. The doctor also noted that my entire spine was degenerating, as were all my joints.

In 2004, although my back pain was mostly gone, I was aware that damage existed and I had sharp pain in my neck. I had X-rays and then an MRI done. The lowest disc in my spine was completely gone; next one up was half gone; I had ground bone away from my lowest vertebra; I had bulging discs and bone spurs in my neck. I set to work on the neck problems in my yoga practice and the pain was gone in about two weeks.

When I started practicing yoga and for years after I started teaching, I couldn’t come anywhere close to touching my toes. I couldn’t do backbends, I couldn’t do forward bends, my standing poses were narrow and wobbly. Even as a teacher, I felt frightened in most poses all the time. I still do.

What got me going in yoga: pain.

What kept me there: hope. And that’s what keeps us all coming back.