Eclectic: Regina - Yoga And My Life

From Regina Price

On January 1, 2007, more than 5 years ago, my life changed phenomenally. I had a brain aneurysm rupture and lost my former life as a psychologist—which included all my speech, writing, counting and understanding money. Apparently, 85% of people with similar brain hemorrhages lose their lives, but I was taken to the university hospital by ambulance right away and the staff and doctors all helped me. I was in the U of A hospital for almost a month followed by another two months at the Glenrose. But I had no speech. Barbara Newborn, a yoga teacher from the States who had a stroke said elegantly: “The loss of language erased my connections with anyone or anything I had ever known. It isolated me from the rest of the world and from myself.”

For more than one year, I tried hard to regain my speech and therefore, went to a speech therapist 3 times a week to recover my language. I also lost my driving licence for the same length of time. But the most difficult thing to deal with was the loss of my confidence of who I was. I realized that yoga could help because it will connect my body and my mind.

Before my aneurysm, I had jobs involved sitting in chairs all the time and after I became a registered psychologist I counselled children in two schools. I often felt pain in my back from sitting on little chairs working with the children. Over the years I took pain killers every day to make it through that day. Over 15 years ago, I went to physiotherapists because I had so much pain in my back. One suggested I could start going to yoga.

In the beginning of my life with yoga, I started out with different teachers and took one class a week but I found it was difficult and painful and my yoga teachers couldn’t help me. Then, in 2006 we moved to Sherwood Park and I started classes at Yoga for Today. Going to classes here really started to help. Then I had the aneurysm …

After three months of living at home, I decided to take my life more seriously. Because of my psychology background, I decided to change “myself”. I started reading and thinking, painting and walking with my therapy dog, Dougal. I took three art therapy courses to learn about my loss and how I could help myself and others through art. Also, I started gardening at our acreage—all because I had my husband loving me and allowing me to try new experiences.

Then, I tried to talk with my daughter, Naomi, about my speech problems and what I believed about yoga and how it could help me in the future. Together, we decided to go to a year of yoga teacher’s training and, than, I learned more about my body and how it moves and which postures could help me. Naomi helped me by driving me and going to classes and writing notes for me at class. I re-learned how to write by writing papers about my asana experiences every month—it was very helpful. It was fascinating and inspiring and slowly, I started talking more and listening more. I began to understand how yoga helped me to re-organize my brain and body in such a way that they work together naturally.

Since that learning experience, I started to going to yoga classes as often as I could—about 3 times a week. Now, that I am retired, I have the time to go to yoga classes and I also volunteer at other places to help people. This has made my life more stress-free and I often have days without constant pain in my back. I hardly take pain killers anymore. I am much happier and enjoy living every day. I want to share my experiences with others to help them find themselves—and to feel more comfortable—like me.