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In this episode I speak with Michael Galinsky, a movie director, documentary maker and musician based in North Carolina in the states. For anyone that follows me on Twitter, they might have seen a thread a number of weeks ago where I spoke about back pain. Late last year, I woke with pain in my left hand side of my back, and contributed it to being a Dad, lifting little people, being out of shape, sitting down for larger periods of time etc. I went to my physio and had several sessions before Christmas and to little or no state change. Christmas was sore. I was more grumpy than usual and entered January and had a private MRI scan. That in itself was an interesting experience, and one for another episode, but my GP called me and said “one of your discs is protruding” and possibly on a nerve. I was shocked. I’d heard about herniated discs but now I had one! I actually got stiffer after for a few weeks.

Was this what my life was going to be like? Is this what middle age feels like? Sheesh - if it is, then this isn’t much fun.

Then I Tweeted.

What came back was a lot of support and advice. Emma Blomkamp, read something in a newsletter by Kai Brach several months prior and tagged Kai, and Kai mentioned a doctor called Dr John Sarno in the States. He encouraged me to Google and watch some stuff. Sarno’s work states that many people have herniated discs but what is the cause for lots of back pain is stress and hidden life traumas. I was instantly skeptical. But I spent 2 hours that night watching lectures of Sarno’s in NYU on YouTube. I was shocked. Last year was brutal. Running a business and balancing everything has been hard on me and hard on my own mental health. Maybe, just maybe there was something in this.

Then Michael tweeted to me. He’s created an awesome documentary called All the Rage several years ago and I bought it on iTunes and watched it. It explores the relationship between the mind and the body. Sarno encourages people to try exercise and ‘watch’ for the stressors. I did exactly this. I cut the grass. I went for a short walk with the kids. I gave them a piggy back and to my surprise, nothing. 

Was this in my head?

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