Stop Squeezing the Golf Ball!

Close your eyes. Slow down your breathing. Make sure you’re sitting somewhere not too noisy. Let’s go through a little exercise.

Think of a golf ball. It’s small, round and hard. Now grab that golf ball with your hand. Squeeze it hard, as hard as you can. Now imagine that golf ball, that you’re squeezing with your hand is lodged inside your head. It’s a blunt pain, it’s gripping, it’s torturous.

Now that you’re squirming and squinting at the screen, you’ve got some idea of what I endured on Wednesday morning.

Wednesday was bootcamp morning. I got up when the alarm went off at 4.30am, pulled on my gym gear, pulled back my hair and headed off ready to do my fitness test. Wednesday marked 4 weeks since the commencement of bootcamp. At this point I was feeling fine, but it was a little chilly.

As a warmup, we jogged down the street and back, and this is when I started feeling uncomfortable. I think uncomfortable is the best way to describe it. It wasn’t hurting yet, but I could feel something out of place in my head. As we continued on with our explosive fitness test the pain kicked in. Involuntary tears were streaming down my face. My body wasn’t ready to give up but this pain was holding me hostage. I haven’t got my results from my fitness test yet. I’m not looking forward to receiving them as I don’t think it can be any good. I certainly didn’t feel like I’d worked as heard and it was mainly due to this pain in my head. After bootcamp I headed home for a shower.

I had the water turned up as hot as I could stand, I was numb, cold and almost paralysed from the pain. After what felt like forever I could feel some sort of feeling come back into me.

I called in sick to work. There was no way I could go through the day if this happened again. I was scared, nervous and apprehensive. As soon as my local doctor surgery opened I made an appointment.

Fast Forward to Appointment…..

After a lot of talking, questioning etc. it was decided that this pain was somewhat psychosomatic. This means that it’s all in my head – quite literally. There was no reason for me to have had that pain. It was my body saying ‘enough is enough’.  This was the longest appointment I’d ever had with a GP. It felt like I was there for nearly an hour. I was being interrogated (new doctor) and asked questions I’d never been asked before. I’ve been referred to see a psychiatrist and I’ve also been prescribed antidepressants.

This is a scary post to write. It’s putting it all out there. I know I need to, because if I don’t, it will consume me.

I hate medication. I don’t believe in medication. Just taking one panadol can knock me out for 24 hours. I was scared what medication would do to me. Would it control me? What were the side effects? Was it really worth it?

I’ve made my appointment – it’s in about four weeks. I’ve started my medication and I’m still scared as hell. My sleeping is erratic (and expected) due to the circumstances. I have decided to believe that I can control my side effects. Or at least one side effect which can be weight gain/weight loss. I need to be stronger than before and stick to clean eating. That will alleviate side effects and see me heal quicker.

Now you know why I’ve been quiet. I’ve been trying to work out whether to post this and how to word it. Now it’s out there. I don’t need sympathy. I don’t want sympathy. I just want to be honest and put it all out there. Everybody’s weightloss journey is different – we all encounter different hurdles.

Enjoy your weekend!!