I’m not going to put any pictures on this post because it may be too graphic for some. Just know that if you Google my condition, the pictures that come up are all way worse than mine, so don’t freak out!

I was diagnosed with scoliosis (unnatural curvature of the spine) when I was about 13 years old. I remember the day we had a scoliosis screening at school; I’m not sure how, but I just knew that I was going to have the tell-tale curve, and I was right.

My parents took me to see a spine specialist.  The doctor was a very young guy, probably under 30 years old, and I remember that even to my 13-year-old self he seemed a little inexperienced.

I asked smart questions, like: “Can I expect this to affect my mobility in old age?,”  “Will I have to go on bed rest during pregnancies due to the extra stress on my spine?,”  and most of all, “Will I have any pain?”  That doctor looked me straight in the eye and told me not to worry about anything, that it wouldn’t affect my life at all, and that the only thing I might have to think about is wearing one-piece swim suits so that no one else could “see it.”

I was embarrassed at his dismissal of my concerns, but what happened next was even worse.  He told me that because my hips were uneven, that I’d need to wear a shoe insert to make my legs the same length.  He grabbed a handful of magazines and made me stand on a stack of them with one foot, and that’s the measurement he used to determine the thickness of the insert I needed!

I wore the insert for about 2 weeks before the excruciating pain it was causing in my lower back was just too much to bear.  I threw it away without telling my parents.

For the first few years, I didn’t really have any pain, just some slight discomfort and a feeling of always needing to pop my back but not getting any relief from doing it.  It was when I entered high school that things started to change. I started to notice that the muscle column on the left side of my spine was enlarged, as if I were permanently flexing that muscle group.  My muscles were working overtime to give my torso the support it needed that my spine couldn’t provide.  Over the years this muscle group went from just feeling tense to feeling painful and ultra-sensitive, and later just feeling numb.

The next problem was with my hips.  I lost the swing in my walk as they got stiffer and stiffer.  It got to a point were I couldn’t walk for more than 10 minutes without the pain starting to shoot down my legs.  A two hour jaunt around the mall would always end in tears and ibuprofen, just getting between classes at school was tough.

The real problems came with the migraines.  I had debilitating migraines at least twice a week, and on the days that I didn’t have one, I would still have a headache that was worse than normal.

I nearly failed my senior year of high school due to low attendance. I stayed home at least once a week, sometimes more, because I was in pain.  I remember getting to the end of the school year with 2 months left until graduation and only having 3 more days that I could be absent and still pass the grade. I suffered through class many days in an effort to ration those precious days off for the worst pain. I am 99% sure that one of my teachers gave me a passing grade because she knew that my actual grade was low due to attendance and not due to my knowledge on her subject.  I was an excellent student, but I was struggling to even leave the house every day, let alone get any work done.

You might ask, “Why didn’t you go to the doctor for all this?”  My parents and I were told by that idiot specialist that scoliosis is not treatable without surgery and that I didn’t qualify for surgery because my curve wasn’t bad enough.  I had just accepted that there was nothing I could do about it, that this was my life and that there were just going to be a lot of things that I couldn’t do and a lot that I would have to live with.

Jeff and I met just before my pain got to it’s all-time high.  He put me on his health insurance before we were even married because he wanted me to get help so badly.  I made an appointment with a chiropractor not really knowing what to expect and not really sure if that would help me.

I already had 4 ibuprofen in my system before I got to my 11:00am appointment.  I told the chiropractor that and he put his hand on my shoulder and said, “Very soon, sooner than you think, you and I are going to flush those pills down the toilet together.”  We talked and took x-rays, but I didn’t get an adjustment that day. He wanted to review the x-rays before he just started popping whatever.  I had to stop by Jeff’s office for a hug afterwards because I was in so much pain and so disappointed that I didn’t get any relief that day.

I finally got that adjustment though, and I can’t even describe the way I felt even immediately afterward.  I saw him 3 times a week for several months and I couldn’t believe how much I improved.  I was feeling like I had as a young teenager again!  I haven’t had a migraine in 2 years and suddenly I can walk for miles without pain!

Running has become important to me because it is something that I had always believed I was not capable of with my condition.  I probably will not ever run a marathon, 4 miles is my maximum without pain, but that’s ok because a marathon is not my goal.   Running is hard for me, and not that enjoyable while I’m doing it, but the way I feel afterwards when I know that I’ve done something that I once thought was impossible is indescribable. My goal is just to enjoy the mobility I have been given and use it so that I don’t take it for granted.

I’ve mentioned it before but it’s worth mentioning again, that I am running my first 5K in late October.  I’m not running for time, in fact I expect to take over 40 minutes to complete it, and that’s ok. Scoliosis has distorted the shape of my ribcage in a manner that decreases my lung capacity, so I’m not going to overdo it and wear myself out.  I’m just going to enjoy having the ability to complete a race like this at all.

Everyone has obstacles that can keep us from becoming our best selves if we let them. I’m not going to let scoliosis keep me from doing anything anymore.

What obstacles do you have that try to hold you back?  How do you work to overcome them, or how have you already?

Jeff and I went to Japan Fest yesterday with my sister, Danielle and her two children, Astrid and Lula.

Here’s Lula with a flower she picked for me.

And Astrid practicing his “smile for the camera” face.

Japan Fest was held at the Gwinnett Convention Center…

We were all starving for lunch when we got in so it was straight to the food court for us!

Here’s Danielle with a chicken and rice bowl…

Jeff and I shared some sushi samplings including one of our favorites, inari, which is fried bean curd skin wrapped around rice.

It was ok.  We got Danielle to try one of each and she was not happy, she was a trooper and didn’t spit anything out though!

Astrid liked this White Peach flavored drink…

Jeff and I had tea, of course.  Ito En makes the best bottled teas, no sugar added which is how we like it.

We split this Sapporo between the three adults (of course.)

The kids were really antsy during lunch so we knew we had to go do something fun quickly or there was going to be a meltdown.

We took them to the children’s area for some arts and crafts projects. Astrid made a fish kite with the help of his uncle Jeff…

Lula was deeply immersed in drawing polka dots on her shoe-shaped box…

Here’s the finished product with Danielle’s addition of a kitty on the front.  So stylish!

We met another kitty on the way to our next stop.  It’s Maneki Neko!  The kids posed with their craft projects, which they were very proud of.

We watched a little sumo…

And looked at the beautiful embroidery on these kimonos…

We watched some traditional dances.  Lula kept saying to Danielle, “They’re so beautiful, mommy!”  She’s in her “princess” phase right now and I think that she was convinced that the dancers were princesses in their “gowns.”

After that we walked through an ikebana exibit…

Then did some balloon fishing.  Astrid caught a big one!

We shopped but didn’t find anything to take home…I kinda wanted a Totoro hat though!

There was more to see but we were pretty beat so we checked out some bonsai then headed home.

Astrid could not wait, as soon as we got in the door he was begging Jeff to let him play Mario.  That kid is definitely a gamer at heart.

All in all a great day.  There were some other things we wanted to see like language seminars and sake-brewing classes, but the kids would have been really bored with that stuff.  And we missed a lot of the really entertaining things like archery and swordsmanship demonstrations for no good reason other than that what we wanted to see always seemed to be on the other side of the convention center and we wouldn’t make it in time.

The day was really about spending time with our lovely niece and nephew, though, which is exactly what we did.  We always look forward to seeing those two, and my wonderful sister.   Thanks for a great day guys!

Jeff and I have both been craving sushi for weeks now, so we thought we’d have a night out at one of Atlanta’s best: Nakato.

We started by selecting a sake.  This one is called Kitaya, a dry sake that tasted very fruity and light.

 

Jeff pouring for the lady first…

We decided to do an omakase dinner for 2.  Omakase means “I’m in your hands,” and it’s where the sushi chef will prepare for you whatever he feels is special or seasonal for that day.  It’s a great way to make sure you are getting the best the restaurant has to offer, and to learn a little about your chef’s style to see if you’d like to sit with him again in the future.

We started off with a whole aji (horse mackerel) for our sashimi (raw fish without rice).  The chef prepared it diced with scallion to be eaten with wasabi, and sliced for eating with ginger.

 

Then we had a sashimi plate of tai (snapper), another type of aji, and bonito (skipjack tuna) with shaved radish and a sticky soy-garlic sauce for dipping.

The bonito was awesome.  I use dried and shaved bonito all the time at home, but I’ve never had it fresh.  I had always just assumed that because it is more commonly dried, that it must just not be a particularly good fish to eat raw.  Wrong!  It was amazing.

 

Then we were given the fried skeleton of the aji that we were served in the beginning.

 

Yes, you eat it bones and all.  Tastes like a crispy fish cracker.

Then we were ready to start our sushi courses.  The chef makes one item at a time and you just keep going until either you tell him to stop….or he stops you.  I’ll tell you right now that we had to be stopped.

First up, fatty tuna torched on top and glazed in soy.  One of my favorites.

 

Pretty sure this next one is aji again.

I forgot to take a picture of this next one, snapper, but Jeff caught it just as it was shoved into my gaping maw.

Next up, ika (squid).  I hate raw squid.  I especially hate that it’s commonly served with a bit of shiso leaf under it, I think the combination tastes like soap.  That and it takes a long time to chew, so the offending flavor is in my mouth for twice as long as anything else.

It’s my own fault though.  I looked the chef straight in the eye and told him that we eat everything, to make sure he wouldn’t neglect to offer us something because he might have thought it was too “adventurous” for us.

 

The chef watches your reactions to each item to try and figure out what you like.  After my conspicuous face-full-of-squid grimace, he offered to make us something soft and sweet.

Behold…ama-ebi with uni, or sweet shrimp with sea urchin roe.

 

Uni is Jeff’s favorite.  His eyes were rolling back in his head.

This is all that’s left of that sweet little shrimp…

While we were gushing about how good that uni was, the shrimp heads were being fried up behind the counter.

 

Again, just shove it in your mouth and bite down.  Tastes like soft-shell crab.

Mmmm…shrimp heads!  I am convinced that the picture behind Jeff here is some kind of calligraphy interpretation of two people gettin’ it on.

Next was salt-water eel, and my favorite of the night, but I neglected to get a picture of it because the delicious smell caused me to shove it in my mouth before I realized what I was doing.

And then ikura (salmon roe), not a fav of mine but one that Jeff really likes…

 

And you know the meal is over when you are served tamago (sweet egg omelet).  This one was sweet and soft enough to be considered a dessert!  Hard to explain what it tastes like, it’s not an exceptionally eggy flavor, more like a pancake soaked in syrup.

 

We ran out of sake just in time.

We were both so full that we didn’t really want to get up right then though, so we both ordered shochu to sip on for awhile.

Shochu is a liquor that can be made from lots of different things.  Mine was made from sweet potato, Jeff had one distilled from barley.  The taste is deceptively clean, you can’t tell just how strong this stuff is, but you can surely feel it!

 

We sipped and talked with the chef about our honeymoon in Japan.  He was telling us a story about how he had lost his wallet in a Tokyo subway with somewhere around $2000 US dollars in it and a bus pass loaded with a huge amount of yen on it that anyone who picked it up could use for themselves.  It was turned in to lost-and-found three days later with everything in it!

That completely lines up with our experiences in Japan.  Everyone was so polite and helpful and respectful.  You didn’t have to worry about someone stealing your stuff if you took your eyes off of it for a split second.  The streets were clean enough to eat off of, the subways were nearly spotless.  People throw their trash away and don’t spit gum on the ground and don’t go shopping in their pajamas even at a convenience store.

Not to mention the food was amazing!  While it’s hard to find a truly authentic experience of Japanese cuisine outside of Japan itself, Nakato does a pretty good job and deserves to be considered one of Atlanta’s best.

The head chef even gave us a few free passes to a Japanese festival for this weekend!  I think we’ll take my little niece and nephew and my sister and gorge ourselves on all that delicious food.  Sounds like a plan!