Nothing makes you learn to live inside your head and detach from your body more than having your body betray you with chronic illness. The irony is that the real message of illness is to learn to live in -- and love -- your body, but by the time you see this you are so furious that you begin to actively ignore it whenever your pain lets up enough for you to do so. I spent all of 2009 and much of 2010 ignoring and enduring the body.

My spirit still wanted to dance. Sometimes the call was so urgent that I heeded it, only to hit the wall in less time than it took for a song to play out; and even if I managed to outlast song's end, I'd pay for it dearly with sheer exhaustion and a sensation of being weak-kneed and anemic that would last for a whole day.

I gave up sugar (and the Pill) and suffered through a cranky week where all I wanted to do was scream at anyone in earshot. But then one day in October, I noticed.. there was a smile on my face and a shimmy in my hips. Just like that. I had so much energy that I literally chair-danced at work for the rest of the day, my earbuds tuned to a collection of Lady GaGa tunes. When I got home that night, I dumped then into my mp3 player, kicked my shoes off and.. was present in my body for the first time in over 18 months. Really, really present. I listened to an endless loop of "Alejandro" and "Telephone" and followed my hips where they led me, raised my arms overhead, swung my head around to fling my hair behind me, snapped my fingers to the beat.. and laughed. The cats fled my room in terror at the whirling dervish with the evil laugh, but I felt fantastic.

It was confirmation that healing was taking place and I was doing the right thing, no matter how hard it sometimes was to stick with the program. I haven't stopped dancing since.. after all, if I can, I will.

*Images from we heart it*