Healing is Part Of The Journey

Healing is Part of the Journey

By Christine Reed

At the end of April, I would normally be hitting the trails, creeping up in elevation as the snow begins to melt, making big plans for the upcoming hiking season. This year was different. On April 22nd, I closed my eyes as anesthetic burned into the veins of my left hand. My only plans for the next six weeks? Healing from surgery.

The first days after surgery were the hardest, of course. I swallowed mega doses of Tylenol and ibuprofen on a two-hour rotation. My best friend and my partner stayed close at hand to bring me water and snacks and help me stand up to hobble into the bathroom. I watched more TV in a week than I’ve watched in the last year. Spring sunshine streamed in the window, never letting me forget what I was missing.

I don’t feel like myself when I lay around the house. My self is on the trail. That’s where I met her. That’s where I go when I feel like I’m losing her. The sun knows my face not through a window but through a layer of pasty mineral sunscreen.

Many years ago, I chose to take care of my body by hiking and running and prioritizing movement, and to give that up—even for a few weeks—feels like a broken promise to the woman I’ve become in those years. That’s exactly why I’d been putting off surgery. Instead of making a doctor’s appointment in early 2021 when my symptoms started, I packed food resupplies for the Colorado Trail. I hiked. I gazed over endless mountain vistas. I frolicked among the wildflowers. I tightened my pack's hip belt down over the dull ache in my uterus, relieving me from having to press my fist into the pain like I normally do on a bad day.

I wanted to heal something on the Colorado Trail. I wanted the trail to heal me, like it had in so many ways before. But walking can only do so much. The trail holds magic, but not that kind.

So, after the Colorado Trail, I acquiesced to the demands of my body and went to the doctor. When they described how they would cut into me, I didn’t worry about the effects of anesthesia, or the risk of complications, or what they might find once they were in there. I only worried that all my hard-won cardio fitness and my identity as a hiker would disappear along with the endometriosis through tiny incisions in my abdomen.

The doctors said I’d be back to my normal routine a week after surgery—the only caveat being ‘don’t lift more than ten pounds and no strenuous exercise.’ They didn’t seem to understand my normal routine at all. So, I asked at every consult appointment and again as I lay in the pre-op room in the worn blue gown. But when can I hike again?

But soon a month had passed. In late May, I sweated my way to McAfee’s Knob in Virginia with almost nothing in my day pack. Then Black Balsam Knob in North Carolina. Now that I’m back home in Colorado, I’m taking every chance to hike I can get. Might even be blowing off other responsibilities to get more trail time. Come to think of it, I’ve probably gotten more trail miles in the last month than most non-thru-hiking months in the last few years.

Chronic illness has made every step on my journey to becoming a hiker a challenge. But every challenge has been an invitation to push myself a little harder.

I was worried that getting back on my feet after surgery would be hard. I was worried that my POTS symptoms would flare up from a month of full rest (and they did). But mostly I was worried that I wouldn’t be mentally strong enough to push through. That I would feel like I was back at square one. That I would wonder if it was worth it.

It can be so uninspiring to be working your way back to where you use to be. To be putting in the workouts, the hours, the miles—all the while seeing an old version of yourself, the before photo. But my life, my body, my journey is not a linear one. Sometimes the trail winds back and forth before leading us to our summit. Sometimes we go one way only to realize we must backtrack and go the other way. Having surgery wasn’t a setback, just a step in another direction toward overall wellness. Exercise and fitness are not a holistic system

of caring for a body. My body also needs healthy food, and rest, and love, and sometimes medical intervention. I’ve added a few more little scars to my collection. Another reminder that this body has a lot of experience with healing.

Like it always does, time away has inspired me to make even bigger plans. The me I found on the trail is a dreamer and she hasn’t gone anywhere. So, here’s to a season of hikes to get my cardio fitness back. At least I’m carrying a little less extra weight—thanks to the surgeon.

Christine Reed is an avid amateur outdoorswoman. Her upbringing as a military brat taught her to see everywhere and nowhere as home. She didn't start hiking until after college, when she realized she wasn't sure where her life was headed and sought out a defined path on the Appalachian Trail. She's currently living in a converted Ford Transit, hiking, rock climbing and kicking around the US, and working on a debut memoir about life, hiking, and human connection.

Follow her on Instagram.