12/09/2025
Just a Girl and Her Firetruck
It feels like a lifetime ago that I was a firefighter with the Melbourne Fire Brigade.
That chapter of my life was filled with exhilaration, uncertainty (which I loved), camaraderie, and deep friendships. I look back on those years with gratitude and continued mateship that has endured long after I hung up my helmet.
A back injury ended what had been a long and valued career. I found myself living with chronic pain for years—pain that felt endless and life-defining. I couldn’t imagine what it would feel like to live without it.
But fast forward to now:
I live without pain.
And for that, I have my yoga practice to thank.
Yoga gave me my life back. It opened up a world of possibilities I never thought I’d experience again.
Chronic Pain and the Nervous System
Chronic pain isn’t just a lingering injury or discomfort—it’s a complex mind-body experience. It differs from acute pain in three significant ways:
Increased Sensitivity to Threat:
The body starts sending threat signals to the brain even when the danger is minor—or doesn’t exist at all.
Pain Amplification by the Brain:
The brain begins to interpret more and more situations as threatening, causing pain responses that are disproportionate to the actual threat.
This learning process—called neuroplasticity—is one of the nervous system’s greatest strengths, but in the case of chronic pain, it becomes a double-edged sword. Your body gets better at detecting danger and producing pain. Unfortunately, this means more pain, not less.
Unlearning Pain Through Relaxation
Here’s the good news:
If pain can be learned, it can also be unlearned.
The most powerful way to rewire the nervous system is by offering it new, healing patterns to practice.
Restorative yoga, breathwork, meditation—these aren’t just feel-good practices. They actively retrain your nervous system to move from a state of chronic stress to one of safety, healing, and ease.
Relaxation triggers your body’s healing response:
It turns off stress
It supports immune function and digestion
It activates growth and repair
It helps unravel the pain-imprinted patterns in the mind and body
Through consistent, compassionate practice, you can teach your system that it is safe. That it can rest. That it doesn’t have to be in emergency mode all the time.
Whether it’s a deep breath, a gratitude meditation, or a restorative pose that lets your body fully surrender—these moments of ease are the medicine.
A life without pain is possible.
And for me, it began with one breath, one pose, one quiet return to myself.
