Rehabilitation isn’t something you finish like a course with a certificate at the end. Twenty years on from my stroke, I still do weekly physio, not because I’m falling apart, but because I’m still putting myself together.
Rehab helps me manage pain, build strength, improve posture and stay connected with my body. After two decades of using a frame and adapting to wonky balance, you might think I’d have mastered how my body works. I haven’t.
Instead, I’ve grown comfortable with the strange, unpredictable sensations and stopped listening as closely. I’d stopped asking “why?” and started saying, “It is what it is.”
But comfort isn’t always progress.
Last week my physio asked me to weave around objects backwards. Walking in reverse, and I couldn’t do it.
I realised I’d adapted by avoiding and choosing the easier, safer movements I already knew. I never walk backwards in daily life, so I never practice it. And when you don’t practice something, you lose it. The “move it of lose it” cliché being incredible true for this.
So, I walked backwards – see a video of it here – unco proof!
Acceptance has been powerful. It’s helped me stop fighting unchangeable things and build a life I love. But acceptance also quietly nudged me into avoidance; to do the easy thing instead of the growth thing.
What I value most about my physio is that she doesn’t let me stay in that small world. She gently exposes me to movement patterns that challenge me, breaks them down, modifies them, and proves that safe failure isn’t the end. That awkward backward stepping looked like this: holding her hand, shifting weight and rocking gently until it became something achievable.
That’s the magic formula for me; exposure plus support plus modification.
I’m still in rehab not because I’m failing, but because I’m still evolving. Rehab isn’t about fixing me. It’s about keeping me moving, trying new things and staying brave.
“Acceptance doesn’t mean giving up, it means knowing that my body is different still showing up. Even when it’s hard.”