In early 2010, Carrie Torres was feeling good. She was 32, her real estate management career was going well and she was in charge of managing 35 buildings in New York City. She had been practising Bikram Yoga for almost eight years and had just completed a 30-day challenge which entails doing 30 yoga classes in 30 days and was in great health. Then her world collapsed.
"I woke up one morning, flipped on my back and went to get up and my whole left side would not move. When I tried to move I got this intense shooting pain. Luckily my phone was close to me and I tried to call a few friends but they didn’t get the extent of what I was going through. One girlfriend is a physiotherapist and she suggested launching my body on the floor then getting into the shower, thinking that the hot water would relax my muscles but I even couldn't do that. After lying there for a while, I realised I had to move because I lived alone and no one was coming to save me. So despite the excruciating pain, I crawled out of my apartment, found a cab and then went to the hospital.
"At the hospital, they gave me cortisol shot and that helped. My super tight muscles relaxed so I could move a little but it still hurt so much. From my neck, all the way down to my lower back was in pain… bending over hurt like hell. They did some tests and could find nothing so they sent me home with a prescription for painkillers and muscle relaxers," says Carrie. "I asked if I could go back to yoga and was told to wait until I felt better.
"Muscle relaxers and heavy painkillers get you high so I was spending my days in this dazed state. At night I couldn’t sleep and I was still in pain. I could not do my regular yoga or dancing or running… overnight I went from being a super-fit and active person to barely being able to drive.
"This went on for months and there was no end in sight. I tried physiotherapy and went for chiropractic adjustments but I would feel better for a few days and go back to the awful pain. I hated being high and ‘out of it’ so I was trying to take as low a dose of the medications as possible. It got to a point where people started treating me like I was a little crazy, like I was making it up because all the tests were showing nothing was wrong. I went for nerve testing where they hook up these electrodes to different parts of you to see if your nerves are damaged and everything was fine, they couldn’t find the source of the pain… plus I looked healthy. I started to feel crazy and very alone. I gained weight and got depressed especially because working out was my source of a social life."
Carrie continues, "After six months of all these tests and medications and even getting cortisol shots every two weeks, my health insurance company finally agreed to pay for an MRI of my spine. Finally I had a diagnosis of three herniated disks, L3, L4 and L5."
A diagnosis is however only half the news and the doctors did not have much to offer Carrie. "They suggested that I continue with the course of treatment I had been on - the medications, cortisol injections, physiotherapy and chiropractic adjustments – or we try surgery where they would insert a metal rod in my spine in the hope that it would realign the disks. I was only 33 and this was horrible news.
"During this time, I started reading a lot on classical yoga, really trying to understand the philosophy behind it. I was also praying and I remember this quote ‘to relax is to let go of the illusion of who you think you are.’ It hit me that I was trying to maintain this executive life and it was killing me. I was managing a staff of 35 people, wearing suits and heels to work, had a nice apartment with designer stuff but now I was drugged up half the time and in pain. I decided to make myself and my health a priority and I went back to yoga."
Though she used to practice for four or five times a week previously, Carrie had only tried one class in the months since she fell ill, and she had fallen asleep because she was so heavily medicated. Now that her only option was a surgical procedure that doctors only offer to sexagenarians, she decided to take matters into her own hands. Herniated disks hurt because they are out of line and compressed so when they brush against nerve endings, you get shooting pains in the areas these nerves send messages to, and around the lower back. "I went back to the yoga studio and spoke to one teacher about my back. She suggested that I come in and focus on back bends because they will decompress the disks by stretching my spine and alleviating the pressure.
"At first it was very frustrating because I could not practise at the same level that I was practising before. My body just couldn’t move like before but I stuck with it. I didn't go back to the doctors, physio or the chiropractor. I changed my diet to raw food vegan [no meat and nothing cooked] - blueberries, Greek yogurt, no carbohydrates… and I went back to four or five yoga classes a week, sometimes doing doubles. Within three months I was off the meds and within six months I was back to my regular practice," she says triumphantly.
After talking a hard look at her life, Carrie decided to commit to teaching people yoga and bringing this gift to people. "I would look at myself in the mirror after yoga and think, ‘this is who I want to be’ so I decided to go for yoga teacher training. I felt it was my calling. Looking back I see that I was really stressed: working 60 hours a week, on call 24/7 for clients and my team, supervising people moving in and out of my 35 buildings, leasing, remodeling and renovations, setting goals for the team… constantly dealing with stressed people. I barely had time for my family. I remember getting dressed for a family member’s wedding in my office. My family would make comments like ‘is Carrie gonna make it or is she working again?’"
Carrie left her six-figure paying job [in dollars!], rented out her apartment, sold her car, her furniture and even clothes; and is now a travelling yoga teacher.
Now about two years since that awful morning she says, "I am the most important person in my life. Nothing replaces peace of mind. I make 90 per cent less money than I was making but I don’t need as many things as I did then, to make me happy. I don’t need retail therapy as medication; I am inspired by my life."
Asked if she believes that there was a spiritual component in all this, Carrie says, "I was raised a Baptist and I believe in Jesus. Since all this happened and I started reading up on yoga and spirituality I have come to believe and see that we are children of God and His spirit is within each one of us so that we are all God. He is within us answering all our questions, telling us what to do next, or where to go; we just have to be silent and listen."
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About Bikram Yoga
Bikram Yoga is a sequence of 26 yoga postures and two breathing exercises that was developed and branded by Bikram Choudhury. It is practiced in a room that is heated to 40 degrees Centigrade and at about 40 per cent humidity. It has been around for almost 40 years and has gathered a global following that includes David Beckham, Lady Gaga and the writer, Valentine Njoroge. It is now available in Nairobi at Lavington Green Shopping centre. For details, look up www.bikramyoganairobi.com
Bikram Choudhury says, ‘it’s never too late, it’s never too bad, and you’re never too old, never too sick to start from scratch once again.’