by Lynne Cox
Emmy glanced at me. “You okay?” she asked.
I didn’t know what I was. I didn’t like the way I was. I didn’t like what was happening to me. I didn’t like that I didn’t know what to do.
I stopped and tried to find a solution. I needed to stop using the heart monitor. It was making me anxious and obsessive, and that was making my heart rate increase. I would monitor myself, take my heart rate manually, monitor my breathing, and ask myself how I was feeling. If I wasn’t okay, I’d slow down, and if I was, I would continue.
I placed my finger on my carotid artery and counted. My heart rate was 102 beats per minute.
“That’s good,” Emmy said.
“Much better,” I said with great relief.
16
REWIRING THE MIND
My life was arrhythmic. I used to be able to find a rhythm. I could set a goal, align my heart and mind, overcome obstacles, and achieve whatever I wanted to do, but now I couldn’t get my heart, mind, and body back into their normal rhythm.
Each day I vacillated between being hopeful and believing I could get better and being filled with despair and doubting if I ever would. It was the darkest and the most confusing time in my life.
Joe knew I was in a dark place and knew how to help me find my way out. He said that negative thoughts were like parasites. They were often transmitted from one person to another by negative comments.
These parasites had infected my head and heart when my resistance was low. They knew how to use my DNA to replicate and thrive. I needed to rewire my mind, think positively, change my DNA, rid myself of the parasites, and restore my health.
He said that in the morning when I climbed out of bed, I needed to look in the mirror and smile.
It sounded like a ridiculous thing to do, but I realized what I had been doing wasn’t working for me, and I needed to change.
The next morning, I walked into the bathroom and looked at myself. What I saw shocked me. The light in my green eyes was gone. The color in my cheeks had faded and my lips were drooping. I didn’t look like me anymore. Where had I gone?
I shook my head. I looked half dead.
You will be okay.
I smiled.
The light in my eyes returned, my face lifted, and the color returned. I felt ridiculous smiling at myself, but smiling made me happy.
Suddenly I remembered a passage from the Bible: This is the day that the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.
I smiled again. It was a day the Lord had made. I was happy to live it.
In the evening I called Joe and told him what had happened, and I said I was smiling.
He laughed and said he could hear the warmth in my voice. I said I was surprised that smiling could make you feel better. I told him I always used to smile when I woke up in the morning. I always used to look forward to each day. I was happy because I had the whole day in front of me, and it was filled with many possibilities.
“When did you stop smiling?” he asked.
“When I was caring for my parents I woke up each morning and wondered if they were still alive or if they had died during the night. I dreaded checking on them.”
“Have you spoken with anyone about this?” he asked.
“Never thought of it before this conversation, but things have changed. My parents are in a better place, and I can wake up in the morning and smile.”
“That’s right,” he said.
He worked with me like a coach and built upon what he taught me. He said anytime I saw my reflection in a mirror, or a window, anywhere I needed to smile.
“What are people going to think if they see me smiling at myself?”
“Who cares what they think. The reason you’re smiling is because it makes you feel better,” he said.
Joe asked me to tell him a joke.
He said that I needed to tell jokes because laughter releases endorphins, and they make you feel better. Laughter temporarily relieves pain, boosts your immune system, and improves blood flow to your heart. When you’re laughing you aren’t stressed.
He asked me if I had seen any comedies recently.
I was only watching spy thrillers and mysteries.
He shared his favorites with me and recounted some of his favorite scenes from the Pink Panther movies, Monty Python, and Young Frankenstein.
We laughed hard. It felt good to laugh.
I told him I saw the movie Up and loved it. The beginning was beautiful and sad. Two kids became best friends, grew up, married, and shared an adventurous dream. The wife died before she could fulfill the dream, but the husband carried their dream forward when he befriended a young boy and a dog.
“I don’t want to see it,” Joe said.
“But it’s sweet and inspiring,” I said.
“Do you know how many times I’ve had to tell people that their loved ones have died? Do you know what it’s like to see their faces when I tell them? I don’t want to see a sad movie,” he said, sighing.
He had seen too much and I had felt too much.
“Make sure you don’t watch the news or anything else horrible or depressing before you go to sleep. Those thoughts can enter the subconscious at a time when your resistance to negative thoughts is low. You need to meditate before you sleep and make it part of your evening routine. You also need to listen to music that you like. It will make you feel happy. Sleep well,” he said.
“You too, buddy,” I said.
The next morning I walked into spin class and started laughing. The room was covered with mirrors from floor to ceiling. I smiled.
Emmy glanced at me and smiled. She sat beside me. Another friend sat beside Emmy. She saw Emmy and she smiled. A friend across the room glanced in the mirror and saw us smiling. She smiled.
A woman sitting near me smiled and asked, “Having a good day today?”
“I am,” I said.
The instructor saw us and smiled. She turned the music up and climbed on her bicycle and started spinning.
The class matched our pace to hers. We warmed up. The class sped up. I moved my legs slowly and felt my pulse. My heart was beating at one hundred beats per minute. I could go faster. It was great.
I heard Bruce Springsteen singing “It’s My Life,” and I sang along: “It’s my life and I’ll do what I want. It’s my mind and I’ll think what I want.”
The music changed and Pink sang about love and life and I sang along: “You’ve gotta get up and try and try and try. Gotta get up and try and try and try.” I was getting up and trying and trying and trying. It felt like I was starting to find my rhythm.
17
JANUARY 19, 2013—JOY AND INSPIRATION
Jay Movius called. He was one of the friends I worked out with. He said he had found the perfect home for me. It was a place where Hemingway would have been happy. Jay was so excited and he was talking fast. It was a duplex, he said; the upstairs was for rent. It had a high wood-beam ceiling, wood paneling on the walls, large cabinets for storage, a perfect-sized and updated kitchen, a bedroom with a fireplace, and a den. It was near the ocean, where I would feel the cool, healing sea breezes flowing through the rooms and hear the soothing sounds of the surf, and the rooms were full of light. He convinced Raylene, his wife and my friend, to take me to see it.
The house, painted a light sunny yellow, had a white picket fence in front and tall queen palm trees, blue lilies of the Nile, bright orange birds of paradise, and red and green crotons.
I immediately fell in love with the home, and thought that the landlord, Shirley, a dancer, was wonderful. She was warm and kind.
Raylene and I followed her to the upstairs. There were two large windows and I could see the rooftops of the neighbors’ homes. I imagined my desk in the large front room. I could write there in the sunlight. I could walk to the beach to take breaks, and Raylene and Jay lived nearby.
I whispered to Raylene, “This is the perfect place for me.”
“It is,” she encouraged.
&
nbsp; But I wasn’t sure if Shirley wanted me for a tenant. She seemed tentative and only asked me a few questions. I was trying to seem happy, but I was tired and frightened. It was such a big change, and I wasn’t sure if I would be able to climb the fourteen steps from the first to the second floor. I would have to climb the steps slowly so I wouldn’t stress my heart, but what would I do if I couldn’t climb them at all?
And there were five large potted flowering plants on the patio. They were beautiful, but I didn’t want to take care of them. I was so tired of taking care of things and I wondered how I would water them. When I filled the watering can, it would be too heavy for me to lift. I guessed I would have to water them one glassful at a time.
Shirley asked me where I went to high school and I told her in Los Alamitos. She asked me if I’d had a teacher named Erin Spruston, and I said that Mrs. Spruston was my English teacher and inspired me to become a writer. Shirley smiled and said they had been best friends for more than forty years, and I felt like I was in the place I was supposed to be. I had a new home that was only a few steps to the bay, and I was eager to walk to the beach and start swimming.
The following evening, Laura and Charlie invited me over for dinner and I asked them if they thought I could swim in the ocean. Laura glanced at Charlie and asked me if I had spoken with Dr. Rawal. I said I hadn’t; I wanted to run the idea by them first.
Charlie looked uncomfortable and said he thought it was too dangerous because the medications I was taking might cause me to pass out in the water.
“Too dangerous to swim for now or forever?” I asked. I couldn’t imagine living and not swimming.
“Maybe you will in the future, but you need to check with Dr. Rawal,” he advised.
I didn’t want to talk with Dr. Rawal and have him reinforce my limitations. I didn’t like this part of life.
In the morning, at my workout, when I told Emmy what had happened, I was close to tears, but Emmy bolstered me. She said, “Swimming’s in your blood, you will swim again.” She was confident.
It was impossible for me to stop thinking about it. I shut down for a few days, but I realized that somehow I needed to get out of my thoughts. Talking with Joe always helped, but I wondered if I was depending on him too much. He had a life, and I kept interrupting it. I just couldn’t deal with losing something that was such a big part of me. Maybe, I thought, if I called him, he would tell me a story and get me to think about something else. Maybe that would help. Maybe I could get my mind in a different groove.
I called and asked him to tell me a story about one of his rescues.
He did, and afterward asked, “What’s up, buddy?”
“Words have a lot of power. I am not sure I want to talk about it. I’m not sure I want to give these thoughts power,” I said.
“You’re right, words have power. They affect everything you think and do,” he said.
“Or can’t do,” I said.
“What is it that you can’t do?” he asked.
I couldn’t speak, and I admonished myself: I should be happy to be alive, have friends and a new home. I should be happy. I am so lucky. But what is life if you can’t do the things you love? What’s the point? What’s the point of all of it? Why did this have to happen to me? Why can’t I have a life now? Why can’t I just be healthy? Why can’t it be my turn? I was so spoiled.
“I’m sorry for bothering you. Everything will be okay.”
“Come on, tell me what’s happening,” he said.
I was afraid if I told him I would start crying and that would be embarrassing.
“You can tell me,” he said.
I took a deep breath and said what I needed to fast so I could get it out before I lost it. I told him about my conversation with Charlie. I didn’t know if I would ever swim again, and I didn’t know if I would get better.
Joe said my body would adjust to the medications, my health would improve, and I would be able to swim again. He was certain. I needed to continue working on my inner dialogue and stop the negative conversations with myself. I needed to meditate and clear my mind. It worked for him. It helped him recover. He was sure it would help me.
“How were you injured?” I asked.
“I fell from a high place and hit hard. I don’t want to talk about it,” he said.
“Thank God you were okay, Joe,” I said.
“Do you believe in God?” he asked, surprised.
“Yes, I do. I never could have done the things I’ve done without believing in God,” I said.
“Okay, before you go to sleep, you need to pray, and before you get out of bed in the morning, you need to pray,” he said.
It sounded like a good idea, but I was already meditating two hours a day, and this would take more time.
“What’s more important than getting well?” he asked.
Suddenly I understood what this was about. This was like a channel swim but was much bigger. When you do a channel swim, you are pushed off course by the tides and currents, pummeled by fierce wind and waves, and chilled to your bones by the frigid sea, but you keep swimming because something inside yourself says you can push further. You reach deeper within yourself. You swim to see how far you can reach and you swim to see what you will discover within yourself. Something drives you on. Sometimes it’s because you believe you can make it. Sometimes it’s an awareness that you have to overcome demons of doubt and despair and find courage. Sometimes it’s because people don’t believe in you and you want to prove your capability to them and yourself. Sometimes you want to do it because people believed you could.
Your tenacity helps determine whether or not you succeed, but it’s the ocean that decides if you will reach shore or not. There are channel swims that take you deep, that transform you and make you realize that you are stronger and more tenacious than you ever imagined. You continue swimming simply because you believe you can. You aren’t sure. But if you knew you could make it, what would the challenge be? What would you learn? It’s working with and against the forces of nature and yourself that transforms you. Each time you do something difficult, you find you can do some more. You change. Your capability increases.
The channels I swam made me look into my heart and soul. They made me see my strengths and weaknesses. They made me face myself. Few things in life compare with this experience. When I finish a channel swim, I know myself well, and that awareness carries into the rest of my life, and through my life. I know it in my heart and soul.
This was the biggest swim of my life. To survive, I needed to take everything I’d learned as an athlete and apply it to overcome these new challenges. It was an epiphany for me. I needed to clearly define my goals, restore my heart function, and live a healthier life. I needed to work with the small crew of trusted experts and close friends who were already guiding me across this channel and cheering me on. I needed to be open to their ideas and committed, consistent, relentless, and spontaneous. I needed to trust my intuition, and when there were moments of serendipity, I needed to realize that there were guiding lights from God leading me along on the right course.
18
DREAMS
It started happening again. When I was fourteen years old I daydreamed about swimming the English Channel. I daydreamed during my classes, in the car, during my workout, when I was in bed. I imagined what it would feel like to swim across the Channel, what it would feel like to climb onto the rocks on the French shore, and how it would feel to break the world record.
The more details people told me about the swim, the more I added to my daydreams. I imagined standing on Shakespeare Beach with the White Cliffs of Dover behind me, the bluebirds flying overhead. In my mind, I heard the surf breaking onto shore and rolling the pebbles on the beach. I imagined the calls of the seagulls, a distant train whistle, and the cool misty air on my skin. I imagined hearing my crew’s voices guiding me toward Cap Gris Nez, and the sounds of the escort boat’s engine.
Now I started daydreaming about my hea
rt. I imagined my swollen heart beating inside my chest and imagined the ventricle shrinking to normal size. I imagined it was beating slower, the contractions were more forceful, and my heartbeat was more evenly paced.
I imagined the blood flowing through my lungs and the oxygen binding to the hemoglobin in my blood, releasing energy and healing my heart muscle.
It had been a long time since I remembered my dreams, but I started having a recurring dream about my heart. The only time I had had a recurring dream before was when I was waiting to swim around the Cape of Good Hope. There was a large great white shark population in the area. I planned to have policemen from Cape Town, who were trained like a special forces team, in the water with me to watch for sharks. But I was concerned that my support crew might not see a great white in time to warn me.
I had a dream that during the swim I was chased by a great white shark and sprinted to the support boat. The crew managed to pull me out of the water before I was bitten. The dream helped me prepare for the shark—a twelve-foot-long aggressive bronze whaler shark—that came up for me during the swim. I swam closer to the support boat, and trusted my sharpshooter in the water to deter the shark and enable me to complete the swim.
The recurring dream I was having about my heart was so vivid that when I awoke, it seemed real.
In the dream I felt something crawling across my chest. When I looked down I saw a large hole in my chest above my heart. I could see my heart beating. It was dark red, normally shaped, but there were white worms half as long as my little finger inching their way out of my heart. They were climbing out of the hole and crawling away across my chest. My subconscious was working while I was sleeping and ridding my heart of negative parasites. They were leaving my body and my heart was growing lighter because it wasn’t carrying the weight of the parasites.
I told Joe about the dream and how helpful it was to imagine negative thoughts as parasites, and how by making those thoughts into creatures inside my body, it motivated me to purge them. I said I was feeling better in every way. But I was sad because I missed my mom.