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The first time I ever heard the word “osteoporosis” I was 16. My nanna had just fallen in an icy car park and broken her hip. She never came out of hospital. I can still remember my mum coming home to tell me nanna had died. One of those moments that sticks with you in your mind forever, as clearly as if it happened yesterday, not 21 years ago.
A few years later mum and I were asked to take part in a study into the hereditary nature of osteoporosis. It was about 1998 and nobody really knew much about osteoporosis, especially in people under about 70. That’s when I first found out I had osteopenia – the very very earlier stages of bone thinning. I was 24. I had a life to live, I wanted to teach yoga, to dance on the beach, to spend way too much time and money following rock bands around the country. I didn’t give a damn I was osteopenic. I forgot about it as soon as I was told. There wasn’t much they could tell me anyway except to drink more milk. I hadn’t drunk milk since I was about 2. (Turns out the milk thing was woeful misinformation anyway, but that’s another story for another day).
Last week I had the results of a bone scan done in January. Like my nanna and my mum I too have osteoporosis. Unlike them I have it at 37 years old. I’m too young to take the drugs that are usually prescribed. My doctor told me to do weightbearing exercise (funny, I’ve done nothing but weightbearing exercise for years. I teach weightbearing exercise for heaven’s sake!) and drink milk (like I say, another story for another day – let’s just say that British medicine is stuck in the damn 80s).
The last few days haven’t been easy. Every time I think about my femoral heads (tops of my thigh bones, where I have it the worst), I imagine them to be like Swiss cheese, riddled with holes. I feel as though I’ve spent my life fighting against health limitations, living the life I want no matter how ill I might feel, but this time I think I’m being given a lesson in acceptance. It’s time to accept my limitations; look after my damn skeleton before it’s too late. Because that’s Ahimsa right?
Luckily for me, I work in an industry that really knows about this stuff. I already know that Yoga and Pilates (done in the right way) are pretty awesome for bone strength. I already know that idiopathic scoliosis and early onset osteoporosis occur together quite a lot. I have information and resources at my fingertips that so many women don’t. Even in this, one of my darkest hours, when I’m thinking “seriously, what else can possibly go wrong with my health”, I’m reminded how lucky I am.
This is one of the hardest blog posts I’ve written to date. It took me about four days and I cried several times during the writing of it. I debated with myself about whether or not to make it public, or just to keep it private as a piece of therapeutic writing. In the end I decided to hit Publish for the simple reason that osteoporosis is so often considered an “old person” disease, not something we have to worry about in our 20s and 30s. There is hardly any information out there for pre-menopausal women with bone-density issues (the Osteoporosis Society of the UK for example specifically supports people over 50) and I’d love to be able to change that.
Over the next few days I’m going to put together a post with some hints and tips for diet and exercise as well as any good links I can find.
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