I injured myself on New Year’s Eve, 2019. Completely sober, I broke some metatarsals in my foot. At my first doctor’s appointment, I was told the healing could take up to three months, due to my age. “My age?” I thought. Had I reached the age when doctors say “due to my age?” Apparently, I had, because I did learn people in their 50’s need the full three months to recover.

After wearing the boot and a special orthopedic shoe, my broken bones were healed, but I still had trouble walking. The doctor recommended physical therapy. When I went to my first session, I met Debbie, the therapist assigned to me. She was in the final weeks of her career. Retirement was just around the corner.

I was sitting on one of their tables when she set my file next to me, and I peeked over to see my diagnosis. I thought for sure it would say something psychological. My bones had healed. What was still wrong with me? “Sequelae” she wrote. “What’s sequelae?” I asked. “It’s the stuff that comes after,” she explained. “First you have the break,” she said, “but then you end up dealing with all of the results of the break. That’s what you have now.”

“Wow,” I thought, and then I asked her, “Aren’t we all dealing with sequelae? Don’t we all struggle with the after effects of the injuries life has given us?” I was being philosophical. She was in her last two weeks until retirement and in no mood, so she said, “Yeah, I suppose.”

Undeterred, I continued , “Think about it, we know from the ACE quiz, people with childhood trauma who have an ACE score of 4 or higher double their risk of heart disease and lung cancer and increase their chance of becoming an alcoholic by 700%.” I asked Debbie, quite earnestly, “Couldn’t we say addiction is a form of sequelae?” “Yeah, maybe” she said.

I see sequelae everywhere, in people with and without addictions. I see it in my own family. I deal with the after effects of my upbringing. My husband, Dale’s life will always be marked by the loss of his father at too young of an age. My sons, who spent two and four years in an orphanage will always have sequelae with them. Hopefully, most days it is minimal, but their hearts were broken as infants, in a time of unimaginable vulnerability. I hate to even think about that time in their lives, and they had to live it.

My friends who experienced sexual abuse as children and those who survived sexual assault as adults are in an ongoing battle with sequelae. Even things like a job loss, divorce or an end of a friendship can continue to be painful, even years later.

Sequelae is ubiquitous it seemed. Aren’t we all putting together the pieces of ourselves after a traumatic period in our life? I shared this with Debbie, and she asked me to try to move my ankle, after she had been working on it. She wanted me to try the steps they had set up for those in therapy.

I moved to the steps, and my ankle stubbornly refused to bend properly. People kept popping into my head. I thought of my friends who continually tried to please narcissistic parents. Even the people I knew who seemingly had perfect lives, had confided childhood secrets that to this day still break my heart. I explained to Debbie that I felt her diagnosis was the junk drawer equivalent of the human condition. She moved me to the exercise bike for ten minutes.

Sure, all these people I was thinking of seemed to be doing okay. If you looked at some of their lives, you would see beauty, wealth, extravagant vacations and happy families. By outward appearances, all would seem well. For those closest to them though, we know the work they do manage the after effects of their trauma.

Some of them have gone into the mental health field in order to help others. Some run marathons. Some maintain beautiful gardens and gorgeous homes. Some are in a constant state of busy, whether through working, volunteering or hobbies. They are doing okay, well even. The sequelae persist though. Maybe it’s become a small background hum and not a thundering ocean.

I keep in my heart those for whom the thundering ocean remains. They might numb it with hours and hours of Instagram or other social media sites. For others, it is alcohol, gambling, sex, shopping, drug use and whatever else can keep the feelings and memories at bay.

Debbie had grown tired of my musings on sequelae. She insisted that all she knew was that it what’s leftover after an injury. For my foot injury, my sequelae were resolved with three PT sessions, after which Debbie retired.

My larger sequelae summons me to address it every day. Some days, I do all the things – the meditation, the journaling, the long walks, the Richard Rohr meditation, the Lectio Divina and the reaching out to others for connection. On other days, I am less successful in treating it.

Even though I know it doesn’t work, hitting the “place order” button from my cart on some shopping site offers a brief respite. The bins of candy at Fresh Market are another antidote I use. It’s kind of amazing the power of 6 or 7 of their chocolate malt balls. A cocktail definitely helps.

Coming here, writing to you, getting my internal monologue onto a page is probably one of my greatest treatment options. So is getting lost in a book. Playing golf and bridge require so much concentration they completely block out any sequelae, although it does come roaring back when the game is over. Still, any reprieve is a gift.

It has taken me nearly six decades, but I do have so much compassion for each of us, even those I don’t like very much. I know we are all trying to put together the many fragments of ourselves into some kind of cohesive whole. Sometimes the picture doesn’t seem to be filling in very well. Instead of creating a beautiful mosaic, our pieces just look like a clump of ugliness we are desperate to hide from the world.

It’s the continuing on though that makes me shake my head in wonder. We are all continuing on, sometimes in less well adaptive ways than others, but each day, we rise to try again anew. I feel confident Debbie would agree, it’s the showing up and the trying that treats sequelae. It’s all just one big try.