What Jennifer Aniston is Doing to Heal Her Back

PS: I became an Endorphin Addict at the age of 18

Welcome to a new week Word Nerds!

This is an extra long iteration of something I originally wrote for Subtack… then posting a snippet of on Instagram… then decided to still post here because it’s been a hard week and I’m annoyed at myself for always throwing work away.

So, I hope you still like this highly random train of thought I had!

I have a pinched nerve in my neck right now from driving, writing, etc (looking down seems to be the biggest reason basically?), but I’m trying to work through it with ice, meds, a slightly-more-zen Substack week… and, hopefully conversations with you!

So, even though I am starting this by “complaining” (wouldn’t it be nice if we could just call it “reporting our truth”? Damn. Now I need to write a Substack about THAT!)…

QUESTION:

How are YOU feeling?

Last night, I read about Jennifer Aniston doing Pvolve workouts and how much it’s helped her back pain…

And I did what I always do.

I started to think about how much I wish I could afford Pvolve.

And then I thought about what I always think about next: How can I make a fiscally and disability inclusive regimen that feels like Pvolve but is for Poorly Girls who need to evolve?

My body is different every single week.

I want to be able to “meet it where it is” (and other bullsh*t I quote with cream and sugar). Worse? I believe it so sincerely as I type this all at 3 AM.

I made a return to professional dance by auditioning for a series of companies in the same year (and shockingly getting offers?! Not all of which I could take) because I was inspired via the rattled last breaths of who I was before my stem cell transplant, and fundoplication, and appropriate lung clearance routines. But for years before that, I was the happiest little calf on the farm I lived on then, by spending absolutely zero-dollahs on my fitness.

Instead, with Saint Stacy Ann Ferguson of the “Lovely Lady Lumps” as my judge: All I needed was my Leslie Sansone Target DVD box set, and the ability to do kickbacks while holding a toddler in my arms.

Eventually, I dreamed big and asked for a $60 mini stepper for the holidays, and I used that mini step to walk myself, my infant, my best friend L.Sansone, and the cows watching through the windows nearby to absolutely nowhere… except the feeling of autonomy.

And I don’t know who out there can relate in a really, really sad and lonely sorta way?

I became an Endorphin Addict at the age of 18, and have never really been able to quit that habit since.

And even though I got my credentials for fitness eventually, and taught formalized classes to women of all ages (and even once became a Gold’s Gym instructor for a time! Who knew that? Not me. I forgot until I was typing this!) = I did NOT love dance growing up.

I’m not sure if someone needs to read that right now?

Maybe reading this at 3 AM, as I’m writing this at 3 AM, wishing I was healthy enough to invisibly trudge my staircase to heaven where DVDs went to RIP but …

No, I didn’t always like what became my life’s work.

I didn’t always like dance.

I loved writing.

That, thankfully, also became my life’s work … but has been stolen from me more and more, the worse and worse my spine has become.

But dance? I’d BEG my mom to let me quit, citing hole-filled persuasions like: “My tights are too tight” (and also probably had holes in them too).

My sisters were the talented ones at dance. I was just… the little sister who’d rather be writing outside, or watching war movies and relating to the Private Ryan’s, or dressing in my boy character (he was named Chip) because I was certain the neighborhood boys wouldn’t notice and would let me play with them.

I was like a drag Princess Jasmine, escaping the palace walls of my perfect Boca suburb.

My sister educated me too well on Twelfth Night most every night, perhaps? I tucked my hair in that baseball hat, and my makeover montage was complete.

I’m talking way too much about myself just to say: 3 AM “myself” wants you to know that you can hate things you eventually learn to love.

And you can feel addicted to small feelings and steps-at-a-time that you might chase forever, even when your body no longer can.

And - and here’s the worst part- sometimes you read articles about what Jennifer Aniston is doing to heal her back and make herself happy through movements and moments… and you know instantly what you’d want to offer your own community if you could.

I know exactly what technique I’d develop for those of us who need a technique to sweat and to feel a part of something, but who can’t fit into the one-size-fits-all box. Worse, most programs won’t even include us with the packing peanuts.

If you asked me right now what I’d make, I could tell you. And I could show you. And it would exist.

So what do we 3 AM Poorly Girls DO when we’re spinning our wheels in a world where we will (literally) never get our steps (or wheels) in the way that we’re told…

But we still feel like we want something more?

We let 4 AM hit… and we keep our hope alive.

I read EVERY comment or word anyone is ever kind enough to share.

I never miss a word you drop and swear I don’t take them for granted- but sometimes I use them to fuel the Writing [almost) Everyday Promise here as best I can- even whilst failing at reply.

But… a reply in a column here is like a very long text response, maybe?

Thank you for staying here… for catching your breath for a moment through the somewhat-dying-art of writing…

And reading anything longer than a two sentence caption…

And for caring about the freelance weirdos of the world who sometimes need to survive, but who’s bodies sadly can’t yet fit into the 9 to 5.

xo