The Tender Ache

I booked a massage for myself yesterday to try to ease away some of the shoulder-tucked-into-my-ears neck tension that’s had me in its grip this past month. I often hold my tension there, and my right shoulder in particular likes to get involved and “help” anytime there’s work to do, even when that work is emotional and not physical.

So I am on the massage table and it’s feeling like exactly what I needed, although I do notice there’s less pain in my upper back and shoulder blades than I would have expected. As we are nearing the end of the hour I am laying face up and my massage therapist presses gently, then a bit more firmly on my sternum. I am surprised that it is quite tender to the touch, and that her pressure there seems to deflate my chest from a rigid position I didn’t know I was holding.

In the car on the way home I become a bit emotional about this unexpected tender space in my body. Was that happening this whole time and I didn’t know it?

Here’s what I thought I knew. I thought my upper back, shoulders and neck are where I store my tension and that it was from an unconscious effort I make to muscle through the tough stuff. I thought I had back issues to sort out that were an isolated thing - though certainly connected to stress and emotions. I thought I knew what was up. But then I was shown a new, entirely unexpected thing. My mid-chest, a deeply vulnerable and tender part of me, was aching, and I had no idea.

Is it possible, I asked myself on the car ride home, that the way my shoulders hunch up and round forward when I’m stressed might be something I do to protect that tender, aching part of me? Is it possible that, when it all gets a bit too much, I physically build a shell around myself to stop the world from touching that ache?

I have had one hell of a month. The world has had one hell of a month…year…decade. Anyway. I am in it right now, sitting sort of near the bottom of the dark well but not defeated by it. I am here, it is the right place to be given the level of loss and stress I’ve lived through these past few weeks. I don’t mind being in the dark and working my way through it. I have decided, just this weekend, though, that I need to put up a less permeable barrier between myself and the world for just a little while. I need to safeguard some time and space for myself so I can work through the darkness and make my way back to me, whole and grounded.

I know that, given enough time and space, my shoulders will settle down and back and my tender, aching centre will be prepared to face the world unguarded again.

xo
Shannon

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Upcoming Shows

Shannon and Jakeb’s public shows for 2024 are all wrapped! We will be back at it after the holidays, but for now please save the date for a December 20th event I’m preparing with Katie Hoogendam. I hope to have all the details for you by the next newsletter.

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