By Holly Herring

There I was, cool as a cucumber.

Eleven-year-old Little Holly was in the driver’s seat of a beat-up, white, 1973 Toyota pickup truck with a bumper sticker on the back that read Turn it Over—except the “Over” was upside down. She was shifting gears, noisily, and driving through the cut-through parking lot by a Motel 6 in Newark, California. Little Holly did not own the truck, it belonged to her step-father, Greg, who was in a visible panic in the passenger seat. 

“Just breathe, Holly. Don’t Panic!” he shouted anxiously.

Little Holly and her parental-type units had been living in that motel for a couple of weeks together and it could get really boring for a pre-teen. A cleaning lady had suckered Little Holly into helping her turn over the rooms daily and change motel bed sheets. 

Eventually, Little Holly’s mother squashed her budding career as an exploited hospitality worker and told Greg to find something to keep her busy. Naturally, Greg decided to teach an 11-year-old to drive in the large parking lot next to the hotel. But, he hadn’t quite taught her how to stop and a line of stopped traffic was building in front of the truck. 

“Breathe, Holly!”

My former step-father wasn’t a Buddhist; he was a recovering alcoholic. However, even he knew that breathing was always an excellent choice when things were going sideways. Granted, a lot of things go wrong around me and I keep a relatively cool head, but I don’t really know how to breathe. 

I live with chronic pain. The thing about this annoying condition is, that I never know when it’s going to be debilitating chronic pain versus just regular chronic pain. Now, if I knew that, I would plan better. I was recently navigating the pain management world and getting a first appointment booked, when I started having a new pain. 

I didn’t need new pain!

The pain turned into a really big deal. Since I have the experience of living with chronic pain, I did what I normally do which is carry on. Finally, I was sitting in this really long workshop, listening to this international genius in my profession talk about absolutely fascinating things and I realized it was hard to focus.

The pain was so bad. I didn’t ask all the questions I had and I barely interacted. I finished the workshop and drove the hour towards home. I was toughing it out, but suffering.

I walked into a restaurant to meet my friend for dinner, but then I stood up before she even arrived and walked back to my car. I had to have a serious conversation with myself about the kind of pain I was having and where it was.

Ultimately, I decided to drive myself to the hospital.

While in the hospital I was not the town’s most compliant and cheerful patient. I was grouchy, I shouted at a hospital employee sent to help, and I would end conversations by simply ceasing to communicate when I was over it. I was in that hospital for three days. There was a steady stream of specialists coming in to poke at me and tell me how “unique” my condition was. I was in pain and sick of the hospital. I just wanted to go home where I believed everything would be better. 

Things were not better at home, just quieter.

Pain was constantly on my mind. When I tried to sleep I couldn’t—because: pain. When I wanted to take my trash out I couldn’t—because: pain. When I wanted to inhale deeply and sigh I couldn’t—because: pain. I was fairly isolated in my home and the thing at the forefront of my mind was pain. 

Just recently I was reading a comment threat on a social media post and one of the commenters was responding to someone else asking what to do when they were in pain. The response was, “Breathe slowly.” My mind flashed back to Greg in that old truck breathing rapidly shouting, “Breathe, Holly!”

Nobody ever told me about breathing SLOWLY before.

Now, part of my condition that was causing this pain was a partially collapsed lung. Breathing, itself, caused me pain. I was breathing short, rapid breaths. Could I breathe slowly? I tried it. At first, it just hurt. I was trying to make these deep inhales so I could slowly exhale and I would instantly get this sharp, stabbing pain, “OW!” It wasn’t working. 

After some experimentation, I realized that mindful breathing would work like a feedback loop for me. I sat comfortably, I turned off the external noise, I sat in a way that I could elongate by chest. I made very small adjustments and waited for the result. Did that hurt? Would this hurt? Once I was quietly listening to my body’s small sounds instead of it’s very loud sounds, I inhaled as slowly as I thought I could. 

OUCH GODDAMNIT THAT HURTS!

Immediately I decided to open my eyes and stop this practice. It didn’t, wouldn’t work. But then I talked to myself in the kind of voice that was patient and understanding and convinced myself to try again. In my mind, Little Holly was gripping the steering wheel with her left hand, cranking those gears with her right. “Breathe Holly—but slowly.”

I closed my eyes and I began inhaling—too sharp! It’s okay, that’s the limit right now. Okay, breathe in slower, shallower and mindfully feel your body, Holly. At the moment I felt the very first pain signal, I stopped. I held that breath and scanned my body from top to bottom for pain. I exhaled slower than I inhaled and felt confident that I knew the boundary between relative comfort and pain. I slowly inhaled once more, repeating the previous process. 

This mindful, slow breathing is something I continued practicing.

It didn’t work at night when I would tuck myself into bed. This is a practice I could really only undertake when I was sitting up. While the pain in my chest did not stop, I became confident that I knew just how deep I could breathe before inducing pain. In that way, I was able to monitor improvement in the depth of my breathing each day. 

I had not cured my pain, but I strengthened my comfort with and knowledge of my body. I taught myself how to change my circumstances. I took my uncontrollable pain and became familiar with it, I discovered ways to work in harmony with it. 

I learned how to look my pain in the eye and say, “You and I are going to learn to get along together.”

I’m not ready to say that my pain and I are great friends and I know we can get through anything now that I am aware and mindful. But, I know now that I can handle this. Better than that though, I learned that if I really want to, I can handle anything life throws at me. 

Just breathe, Holly.

 

Photo: Pixabay

Editor: Dana Gornall

 

Did you like this post? You may also like:

Just Breathe: An Asperger’s Story.

How to Live with Chronic Pain & Illness. {Book Review}

 

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Holly Herring
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