by Anon, 42, UK

Osteoporosis is not just an illness for ‘old people’; I know, because I was diagnosed with Osteoporosis at the age of 39.

Most people think of Osteoporosis as an illness that women get when they are older, when their bones become weak and fragile, but it can occur in much younger women, and in men too.

My periods had stopped when I was in my late thirties for around 12 months. When I was being investigated for this, I had a bone density scan and I was told I was on the borderline for having Osteoporosis. Recently I wanted to know if it had gotten worse over the last three years and asked to have another scan. It was then the doctor said I had already been diagnosed with it on the previous scan!

In my search for answers and healing during those three years I used both Esoteric Medicine and Western Medicine together, to support my health and healing, and to get a deeper understanding of the energetic root cause of my illnesses, including looking at what energy I was living in, allowing and choosing that resulted in me being ill. Basically my healing process was a marriage of both Western and Esoteric medicine, one from the outside, the other from the inside, to get to the whole truth of what was going on.

But back to the Osteoporosis, I always thought Osteoporosis was an illness that only occurred in older women, as I am sure many people do, but here I was at 39, being told I had it. There is no ‘cure’, but weight-bearing exercise is supportive for the body and its bones. I already walk, and love lifting weights, so that was all good. I also generally eat a healthy balanced diet.

People with Osteoporosis are often recommended to increase their dairy intake for the calcium. I remember the doctor telling me that in the hospital and he was quite flabbergasted when I said I had a dairy free diet. Most people on reading this, would be like, oh well if you are dairy free, that’s why you must have it, you need more dairy. We have the belief that it’s just what we eat that will prevent us from getting Osteoporosis. When that is not true. I ate dairy for most of my life and still have it. And even if you don’t or can’t eat dairy, it is still possible to get enough calcium from many other food sources like seaweed, sesame seeds, nuts and green leafy vegetables.

I’ve had bloods taken for several others things since my initial diagnosis three years ago, and many times they have checked my calcium level, all of which come back fine and normal, and I’ve not eaten dairy (apart from maybe a bit of chocolate when things were tough in my personal life and I didn’t want to feel them) for 9 years; I don’t consume milk, cheese, yoghurt etc., but I eat plenty of broccoli, spinach, almonds, and kale.

I also when I initially got the diagnosis, took good quality calcium tablets for a few months, nothing long term, as my calcium levels are fine, but if they were to come back low then I would take this again, as I am all for getting any medical support I need. I also support myself with vitamin D3, good for the bones, and as we don’t get lots of sunlight where I live, I think many people in our country probably have very low levels of this vitamin.

But there is also another side of this illness I knew I had to look at, to bring it all together. I could have just stuck with the outside view looking in of Western Medicine, which is amazing, incredibly great work, but I know there is another part, and that is through Esoteric Medicine that comes from the inside, looking at the energetic root cause, how I have been and am living, and how it contributed to my illness.

According to Esoteric Medicine which understands life, humans and illness and disease at the level of energy, the energetic root cause of Osteoporosis is self-neglect and not loving one’s self to the bone.

This makes absolute sense to me, and I can see and feel very clearly how true this is and how it has and still does play out in my life, and I can honestly say it’s no wonder I have this illness.

If you look up self-neglect it is actually a medical condition, what you see painted is a picture of people who may have mental or physical health issues, whereby they don’t wash, don’t have good personal hygiene, maybe don’t socialise, hoard things, houses are a mess, don’t take care of their health and surroundings etc. Which all of course is self-neglect, but to me this is the extremes.

Why do we let things get to the extremes? Is it so that the things we need to say no to, the acts of lack of self-love and self-neglect that we do every day, we can accept as normal and carry on with these unloving and wayward behaviours, because they are not extreme, so we can then say we are okay, when in truth we are not?

For me, I am not out of this yet, I am still working on lack of self-worth, self-neglect and lack of self-love, but I am a far cry from where I used to be. Up until my early thirties I was as hard as nails, not in a fighting way, but my body was hard. I thought I could do everything by myself, tried to out-do the guys with weights at the gym, drank too much, was in abusive and very unloving relationships, put everyone else first, didn’t have the self-love in my body to say no to relationships or people that abused me. I worked hard, and partied hard, hard as in long days, and hard as in a hardness in my body. I recall jumping over the bar in a bar and restaurant I managed, where a fight broke out between football supporters and I got in the middle of it, shouting at them to stop; now I am a petite woman, I didn’t think twice then, but I would never dream of doing that to myself now.

Again you might think all this is extreme, but I still see self-neglect and lack of self-love in my days, even though I have changed so much, and by change I mean I am more myself now than I have ever been since I was a little girl; there’s a joy, a lightness, a playfulness there, a deep care of people, and more love and understanding for myself and others every day, but there are still the so called little things. It’s these ‘little things’ we need to address for our health and for the world, and it’s by no longer choosing these little things that can and will support us to live a much more true, vital and healthy life.

For me the little things can be overriding going to the toilet when I need to go, not having enough food in the house, just making do with what’s there, yet I know I’d go to the shops to get say one or two things for someone else, so why would I not do this for myself? It’s learning to say no to abuse, not to the person but what can come through another or even myself, the negative thoughts, judgment etc. It’s buying the shower gel, or bath salts I feel to when I feel to, honouring what I feel when I feel it, like buying myself flowers. It’s funny, or quite sad really that I think nothing of buying another flowers or spending money on someone, say buying a jumper as a present, yet I don’t do this for myself. For me that is all self-neglect and lack of self-love. It can be as simple as not going to bed when I’m tired or saying yes to something when I feel to say no. There is so much that we do that is self-neglect and lack of self-love, even down to the fact that we can’t be bothered preparing ourselves a nourishing meal, or taking time to rest. It can be rushing, not giving ourselves enough time in the morning to get to work, it can be putting oneself down. There is just so much and everyone will have different things they do.

For me this is all an unfolding process just now, and one that is quite fresh, so it will be interesting to see where else in my life self-neglect and not loving myself comes up, so that I can change these behaviours and let these old beliefs go, and also to see if my Osteoporosis reading has changed, the more I learn to love myself to the bone.

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Postscript

After writing this blog, I received a call from my doctor letting me know that in my most recent scan results, my bone density has risen by 6%. That may not seem like much to people, but to me it’s a miracle and evidence of the healing work I have done. My diet has not changed, how I exercise etc. hasn’t changed, but what has changed is the love I am deepening for myself, my self-care, self-honouring and self-devotion. And I know it will continue to forever deepen and evolve.

Read more:

1. Osteoporosis – how could this happen to me? 
2. Learning the meaning of osteoporosis.