Better Bones

For the last six weeks, I’ve been adjusting to a new reality. Nothing life-threatening, but certainly life-altering.

I’d heard of osteoporosis, but never knew what it was or thought about having it myself. I have four older sisters all of whom have the bones of a twenty-year old; that’s what I’d always heard. It was almost mythological how sturdy our family’s bones were. But after a bone density scan in mid-December, I learned I have osteoporosis in my spine, and osteopenia – the precursor to osteoporosis - in my hips. Bones that should look like tree trunks look more like honeycomb in my case. So much for my self-image of sturdiness.

My doctor made time to see me right away. The treatment, she said, was a drug called Fosamax that slows the progression of the disease. Maybe some of you take it? 30 million Americans do. It’s a pill you take once a week, on the same day each week, first thing in the morning with lots of water and no other food. After taking it, you stay upright for 30 – 60 minutes to avoid damage to your esophagus. Directions like that make me nervous.

I’ve prided myself on not having to take any drugs. I don’t like them, and I prefer to let my body do its own healing. On the other hand, I don’t want to have a broken back or a shrinking body. What to do?

Turns out, my eating disorders from age 17 to, say, 27, are to blame. The medical world calls it malnutrition. Just hearing that word was a shock.

A woman my age (65) needs a bunch of vitamins and minerals including 1200mg of calcium spread out over the course of the day. I didn’t know that. Now, I cut a 500 mg tablet in half and take it twice a day. The other 700 mgs I get from the food I eat, which means reading labels and adding things up. All of this is tiring. Confusing. Annoying. And good for me.

Weight-bearing exercise (including the dreaded squat) is critical for any hope of rebuilding my bones. I’ve always walked a lot. Now, I walk just as much, but three times a week I walk with a weighted vest that I add another pound to every ten days or so. It straps onto my torso and somehow relays to the muscles and tendons around my bones, that they need to get cookin’. I imagine them sending out little brigades of healthy, sticky cells that adhere to what’s left of my bones, like spackle or that spray foam you use to fill holes where the mice get in.

My friend Sarah, a yoga teacher, has encouraged me to think about the word nourishment. So right. I’ve never thought about that. For too many years, I’ve assumed my health was optimum when I ate less; deprived myself more.

In early January, after another sleepless night wrestling with whether to take the medicine or not, I realized it wasn’t the pill I objected to so much as it was the diagnosis. I didn’t want osteoporosis. I wanted bones I could rely on. I didn’t want to feel fragile or old. I didn’t want to break. The following week I woke up early on a Saturday morning and thought to myself, if Forrest could do 13 months of chemo, surely I can take this pill. I took my first one a few minutes later, then I took a long, meandering walk.