Of Puzzles: a Health Update

This will be in two parts. Even though the first part came chronologically second, I'm still debating on if I want share the second part. Sorry!

Credit: National Geographics

After trying to put puzzle pieces together for a long time with nothing coming together, you flip the table over in frustration only to find the pieces fall perfectly in place.

If you're like me, you stand there staring at the puzzle while the occurrence sinks in. "But this is real life. That doesn't happen in real life." My life isn't a movie. My life is real, and movies are not. This is why it's important to have your own experiences.

By the by, we're 80% sure what's wrong with me.

My grandmas (close family friends, but we claim them and they claim us) suggested a doctor to me. After ending it with the last doctor, we've been getting a few suggestions. If you ever find yourself in the land of medical-ness, I wish you the best of luck. We tried getting into these doctors but couldn't get an appointment. (There's either a flaw in phones or receptionists. Let's blame phones.) Which my regular medical doctors, it could be 3 months before there's an opening. We had an appointment with the doctor my grandmas suggested in less than a week. (Props to her phone!) I was super skeptical though.

A chiropractor? Really? The last thing I wanted was someone sitting on my back. What on earth could she do for me? The only comment that came with the suggestion is "She's gentle". Still didn't mean anything to me.
One of my major concerns is that I wanted to treat the cause, not the symptoms. I want to get to the bottom of this! I can't live like this- a life like this is not living.

I went to the appointment SUPER skeptical. I have respect for my grandmas though, so I went to humor them and my mom. The first thing I'm told is to take everything I know about chiropractics and put it in a box. This doctor was only interested in treated the cause. Cool! Me too!

We talk about my novel of a health record, what we've found out so far, and all that jazz. I've never been in an accident or broken a bone. We decide to find a cause starting from birth. I guess it wasn't anything too eventful or exciting since I can't remember it. She asked my mom and got pretty much the same answer. No problems. "Where there forceps?" "Yeah, there would have been forceps." (That's something I didn't know.) "That's the problem!"
What?
She explained all her young patients who come in had a c-section or forceps at birth. This causes strain on the neck as it's pulled and shreds up fragile fibers within the body. From the get-go, your body is already trying to compensate.
She did a simple exam. Turns out there is a whole inch of difference between my legs! Most people at that point are given inserts. My case, of course, would be different. My weight is mostly on my left size.

Credit: Sebastian Eriksson Self Portrait

Next up, x-rays. This revealed how truly contorted my body is. Terribly! It also reveals an extremely important factor. The atlas, the very first vertebra within the skull, is so far off in the wrong spot that it's crushing my brain stem. My neck curves the wrong way. My spine is a mess!
Why is that important? It's cutting of my nerves, one of the major ones being the vegas nerve. The vegas nerve is in charge of the heart, lungs, and stomach. It would be why I respiratory issues, and why my heart freaks out.

I read some papers she sent home with me, one of which is a chart with symptoms and the related section of the spine. So many things are explained, dating back to preschool and elementary school! She wasn't kidding when she said it was something from birth.

It was such a simple thing, yet it took us so long to find it. The treatment is adjustment of the atlas, which means a gentle message behind my ears. I've had 3 session and feel SO much better!

Why now? Why did it not become so severe until Serbia? It's something that builds up until your body says "Dosta mi je!" and gives in on itself. It could have been my extremely heavy and unbalanced bag, the stresses of missionary life, or it was just time.

As exciting as all of this is, it's only the picture of the puzzle. The circumstances surrounding it, the tipping of the table and the falling together, is what makes me sit down and really look and rejoice in it.
But that is part 2.

Part 2 is possibly still in process.