How I Relieved the Pressure on My Talus and Found My Voice Using the CANTIENICA® Method
An MRI. A diagnosis like a guillotine.
And the prospect of 50 years of pain.
Today I’m pain-free. I’m dancing. I’m singing.
That’s my way.
By Jana Fuchs
My Voice – The Unexpected Beginning
This is the story of my journey to a pain-free foot, despite cartilage damage in the talus (osteochondrosis). But let’s not start with my foot—let’s start with my voice: The hoarseness typical of this time of year had taken hold of my voice, at times completely.
When I got home after work one evening, my husband and child weren’t back yet. Boom—I cranked up my favorite music really loud. I sang along even louder and thought: Waaait a minute—I’m hoarse!?!
But I could sing as if there were no tomorrow. No hoarseness, no strain at all, despite the volume. With nearly 20 years of choir experience and plenty of vocal training, that was—quite unexpectedly—the most incredible voice I’d ever had.
My voice floated above everything, strong and grounded. For the first time, I truly felt how the body can be an instrument! Unbelievable.
This completely unexpected and wonderful sense of accomplishment after three and a half years of intensive CANTIENICA® training of the deep muscles now allows me to share my success story with you with confidence.
I’ll never forget the orthopedist who looked at my MRI about six years ago and said, “Oh, you’re going to have to find someone who can get you through the next 50 years.”
Osteochondrosis. Damaged cartilage in the metatarsal bone. The diagnosis and the doctor’s verdict were as harsh as a guillotine.
Fortunately, he referred me to the right place; the surgery was necessary and a success: A “Tight Rope” was stretched between my calf and shin to replace the syndesmotic ligament, which had been damaged but went undetected following a sledding accident.
I was lucky with the surgeon who treated me afterward and the physical therapist, and I’ve made a good recovery.
But then came the pregnancy—and with it, both old and new problems, as well as the solution.
My ligaments and tendons became weak, I gained a lot of weight, and the pain in my foot became a daily occurrence again.
Two years after my child was born, I felt a sharp pain in my foot every ten steps.
I had reached the point where I turned to both my physical therapist and my surgeon for help again. Another surgery was on the table, but the options were unclear—I was at my wit’s end.
That’s when it dawned on me: That “someone” I need to find to get through the next 50 years is me!
The Turning Point
Luckily, I discovered CANTIENICA® training during my postpartum recovery. It was love at first sight, and starting in the second month, I began toying with the idea of becoming a certified instructor —because it does me so much good that I want to incorporate it into my life as much as possible.
After that frustrating doctor’s visit, I decided that from then on I would walk only the way I had learned in a CANTIENICA® class: diaphragm loop raised, stretched diagonally backward, actively lifting my entire body off the ground, feet floating on little clouds.
At first, I walked back and forth across the living room. The sharp pain didn’t come. I ran out to the playground to join my husband and daughter. The pain stayed away. Even during our next vacation—ten days in the mountains—as long as the diaphragmatic loop stays up and I stride through life with a spring in my step, the pain stays away.
It works!
I now know that the CANTIENICA® method has not only given me the physical tools to train my deep muscles and keep the joint space open enough so that as little weight as possible is placed on the talus with its damaged cartilage, and to lift the diaphragmatic loop a few extra millimeters when under extra strain, should the pain ever flare up. But the CANTIENICA® method has also made me realize, for the first time, that I can do this on my own: free myself from the pain through regular training.
One last thing: Please don’t get me wrong. I’m incredibly grateful to my doctors and my physical therapist for the excellent care they provided—I was in the right place at the right time.
And yet, lasting success—permanent freedom from pain—only came when I told myself, “I can do this.”
I can “wrap” my foot with my muscles in such a way that the pain goes away. I can walk without pain. And now I want to share that with the world using my wonderfully powerful voice: It’s possible!
Even after diagnoses that come crashing down like a sword, or hang over you like the Sword of Damocles: It’s possible. I’m moving forward! And the best part: I can dance again, as much as I want.
Jana Fuchs, 40, is a CANTIENICA® instructor in Berlin-Wilmersdorf and Friedenau, as well as online.
