Osteopathy

Does anyone here know about osteopathy?

I am seeing an osteopath, Dr. Mary Bayno, recommended by NYC's most in-demand vocal coach/therapist, Joan Lader.

I can't believe in the year and a half I've spent seeing countless voice therapists and ENTs, not ONE said, "Gee, maybe we should send her to someone who can physically manipulate and relocate the muscles and bones that are out of line!"

I have had two sessions with Dr. Bayno. The main interferences when I sing are from my hyoid bone and tongue being out of alignment. Both are being pulled to the left by muscles (the hyoid bone is the only bone in the entire human body not connected to other bones; it is held in place entirely by muscles).

It scares the everloving SHIT out of me that my entire laryngeal area is tilting the wrong way.

Dr. Bayno tried to release the tongue during the first session/consultation, but then she said the muscles in the back of my head are so tense that she needs to work on those first before she can release the tongue.

But on the second visit, I said to her, "Do you think we will be able to release the tongue when the time comes?" and she said, "Yup!"

I forgot to ask her if she can realign the hyoid bone, but since it is connected to the tongue, that is probably a given. I found on a website, "Treatment to normalize the thickened suprahyoid tissues and thus to restore the hyoid bone to its natural position produces remarkable results in many cases of throat trouble, such as tonsillitis, pharyngitis, etc. " So we know that osteopaths DO work on realigning the hyoid bone.

Right now I have my middle range. Low range is breathy/gravelly from the tongue depression, high voice wobbles from asymmetry of tongue movement.

If these treatments don't work, I'm jumping off the tallest building I can get to the roof of without security stopping me. Not joking.

Let's pray for the best.

Myofascial release therapy

So, I've been receiving myofascial release therapy treatments from a fabulous masseuse named Christine (www.lifelightmassage.com/vmassage.html). In just three sessions, she got me belting again without pain! Although I do feel a slight knot on the side of my throat after, but considering I used to get stabbing, sharp pains after I tried to belt, or a feeling like I was choking, that's progress.

Evidence: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tJLIARUSpe8
And: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X04F92jdsGY

I can't believe it took me so long to find this treatment. I did get some treatments from an ENT who charged a whopping $250 for just 30 minutes. A disgrace! 30 minute sessions weren't doing ANYTHING for me, and now I get 90 minute sessions for less than his $250. Plus, Christine is much better at it.

I have little control over my very high and very low voice, which is most likely due to my tight cricothyroid muscle, which is the muscle that tilts to allow expansion and tension of the vocal folds, making it responsible for very high and very low pitches. I keep trying to sing low like I did before that voice "therapist" fucked me up with straw phonation, but I only feel my low voice on the left side of my throat and it cuts in and out of fry if I try to hold it out, and currently I can't do slides. Christine said the cricothyroid is much tighter on my right side, which explains why I feel like my low voice is stuck on the left.

I have been pushing every day to try to regain my low voice, but I'm realizing now I should probably lay off and wait for more myofascial treatments to manually release the tightness that is limiting my vocal muscle mobility. I'm supposed to see a "miraculous" osteopath, Dr. Mary Bayno, on April 27, who will probably spend 3-8 sessions with me, once a week. Then the plan is to go back to Christine for maintenance. Christine advised me NOT to sing the day of a massage to give the muscles a chance to "learn" their new (correct) positions.

This is how my low voice sounds now. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QTJTLwYs93k It's breathy, but I posted a full performance video in a Sentenced/Poisonblack fan group and got a lot of "likes" and a few very nice compliments in the comments section. The thing is, a lot of pop singers purposely sing with a breathy voice, so people who aren't vocal scientists don't hear it as an issue. Plus, a microphone does WONDERS for a breathy voice! The lead singer from Lillix has a very breathy chest voice and it is beautiful. Still, I wish to regain my full, lush low voice which was once very thick, velvety and sultry. But I'm realizing now I can't expect results there until I've had more hands-on, osteopathic/myofascial treatments.

I am amazed that in the nearly 2 years I spent going to voice therapists and ENT's, not one mentioned seeing an osteopath. I feel like if it had been mentioned to me a year ago, I'd have seen one and I'd be better by now.

So, everyone please wish me the very best with this highly recommended osteopath and myofascial release treatments. It would be just perfect if I could go straight back into voice lessons and not voice therapy after these treatments, but we will see what happens.

TRYING to be positive. Is positive realistic?

Okay, I am trying this new thing.
I am trying to not worry about whether I'll sing again. I am trying to just decide that I WILL SING AGAIN.

I'm trying that "Law of Attraction" thing from "The Secret." It is difficult for me to believe but I am TRYING because two people I love very much are really firm about it, and no, I DON'T think they're just saying it to shut me up.

I actually CAN sing pretty well right now, but the words move all over my head, left, right, diagonally up, diagonally down, moreso on exercises than on actual songs.

I know this is all because of incorrect muscle pulling. My vocal cords are 100% normal on the scopes. I also no longer get stabbing pains after singing, and the choking sensation is dying down a lot!

I am seeing this new massage therapist, Christine, who specializes in vocal massage. www.lifelightmassage.com/vmassage.html

I am hoping it will be as simple as as the muscles relax, they will, over time, automatically go back to their normal functioning.
IS THAT REALISTIC?!?!?!?!?!

I am also doing vowels with my new voice therapist, Marlene. Because my tongue base is pulling to the left, we are trying to neutralize its position back to center.

I Can't Forgive Myself

     There was a time when my voice problems could have been easily fixed with a little pill called Nexium.
     I'll explain. 
     Early Fall 2013, I went to an ENT with complaints of a constant post-nasal drip creating a lump in my throat. Turned out it was reflux. He put me on Dexilant, which he conveniently had free samples of, then on the follow up visit, told me I had to stop it.
     "You're too young," he said, "You could get osteoporosis. I only put you on that drug as an experiment to see if you had reflux."
     So I came off of the drug cold turkey because he didn't wean me like you're supposed to do with those drugs and I got way worse.
     I took OTC Prilosec for a while and felt a lot better, but his warning haunted me and I kept going on and off of it.
     March 2014 I FINALLY got an appointment with an extremely busy singers' laryngologist in Tarrytown. He also refused to prescribe me reflux medication and put me on a HIGHLY restrictive, mostly vegan diet.
     I cried hysterically for days because I couldn't have my favorite foods, which were all acid foods. Chocolate, tomato sauce, balsamic vinegar, pickled things, lemony things, etc.
     I went on and off his diet and had perfectly normal voice days when I followed it, except for a bit of trouble projecting high notes, but certainly no problems speaking ever. I had a hard time even speaking when I went off it the slightest bit. His voice therapist actually cured me and got my high notes back in full projection. I got an offer to be in a girl band. I had a new car, polished voice, I was ready.
     But I was skinny. Something I had never been in my life. My mom had a huge worry about it. Looking back, I was actually at an ideal weight and not underweight at all. Just underweight compared to how I used to be.
     ALL I DID was BITCH and COMPLAIN about the reflux diet, about how much I hated my body for rejecting so many HEALTHY foods like tomatoes and lemons. My self-image was very poor because I resented my body for having this condition. I used to eat plates of pasta with tomato sauce and tell my body, "TAKE IT, YOU ASSHOLE, AND DON'T REFLUX IT BACK UP, YOU PIECE OF SHIT BODY OF MINE, MAKING ME UNHAPPY!"
     I should have been more open-minded and should have realized I could have found new favorite foods.
     Instead, we went to another ENT in hopes that he would give me a reflux drug like Nexium so I'd be able to eat whatever I wanted, but instead he overreached and pointed out a small paresis that would have regenerated on its own in 18 months (confirmed now, it did) and sent me to his voice therapist. Her exercises hurt me but I kept doing them because I was so relieved I could eat normally again that I assumed I could trust her. Also, I was so angry at the doctor who put me on the highly restrictive diet that I wanted him so badly to be WRONG to the point where I kept doing exercises that, if not blinded by anger at the past doctor and a burning desire for chocolate, I would have realized would hurt me down the road.
     Every morning I wake up and I'm actually in denial. I think I'm still 25 and can control my voice problems with food. It always takes me about 10 minutes to realize it's not the case anymore, that I have been recovering from severe muscle tension dysphonia caused by a VOICE THERAPIST who worked with a doctor who gave me an OVERREACHING DIAGNOSIS.
     You see, it's MY OWN FAULT because I didn't follow the diet, bitched about it and drove my mother nuts enough to bring me somewhere else.
     All day I think about how my life would be different if I had just accepted the diet. I'd be an established local NYC musician by now. I'd have my own apartment, because I wouldn't have spent the past 2 years barely able to talk and therefore unable to work. I'd have a boyfriend. I'd have a life.
     It has been suggested to me by a couple of people that my refusal (or I think, just plain inability) to forgive myself is slowing my recovery from the dysphonia.
     The last doctor I went to said, "Well, with Muscle Tension Dysphonia it's all muscle memory, so you can undo whatever has been done."
     Technically he is right. But muscle memory takes a long time to reverse and I feel like my muscles just don't want to reverse fully.
     I'm making progress in voice therapy, my pain has decreased significantly and my singing is coming back. Still, I'm worried I might never be able to reach my full vocal potential now that I would have if I had never seen that voice therapist.
     Plus the years I lost - 25, 26. I'm 27 now. Will people accept me singing Avril-like music when I'm pushing 30? Did I blow all my chances?
     I hate myself for what I did to myself and I want someone to shoot me.

I'm all alone.

I'm not allowed to talk about feeling suicidal. I feel it every day, but I won't act on it because I know that whatever combination of pills I swallow won't kill me, and I'll end up back in the psych ward. If I jump off the Brooklyn Bridge, I'll survive with massive spinal injuries. I won't die. I'm not that lucky.

Even my own mother doesn't show me love and affection anymore. She's just constantly angry at me for feeling suicidal. When I'm home, she locks her bedroom door.

Put yourself in my shoes. Imagine you put your whole life into your passion, went to conservatory for it, then went to a medical "professional" for a WRONG diagnosis who fucked up your instrument. Then spent 2 years going to "professionals" who couldn't help you or could only help you partly. FINALLY ONE person's methods start to show you major improvement and then BAM! You fall down some stairs and shatter your fucking ankle and then you're in Mt. Sanai Hospital for a week and stop doing the voice therapist's exercises because you're exhausted from surgery and relapse HARD.

Now it's January. It's been a total of two years of trying to fix what that SHITTY voice therapist did to you and you've just gotten out of a 3-week stay in the psych ward for a suicide attempt, and miraculously, for an entire month, the worst of the pain, the stabbing pain, is completely gone. You're singing again and although it still feels off, you think for sure that the worst of the pain is gone. Then you overnight babysit a kid whose single mom is away on business for 4 nights and you catch her fucking LARYNGITIS and then the old muscle memory which has only been gone for a month (not gone long enough to be completely out of your system) comes back in and clenches up your throat muscles thinking it needs to help your sick larynx push your vocal cords together. Laryngitis goes away but the awful pain that you thought was gone forever remains. Then you go see an overpriced, dickface doctor who despises you because you're not all smiley when you're in excruciating pain and charges a fortune for a half hour laryngeal release massage and 5 or so days later you're better, but your suicidal outbursts have already made your boyfriend whom you ADORE put your relationship "on break."

You're seeing a new speech therapist who is GUESSING because there's no standard plan of care for a tongue base pulling to the left - it's so uncommon. Then you find online a woman who does vocal massage for your condition, and the testimonials are very encouraging, and you start to feel hope, but then you think, "Oh, aren't I just a fucking dumb shit for having hope. I've only seen a dozen other 'miracle workers' who didn't cure me. Why should this one be any different? I'm a DUMB SHIT!!!"

Then you call your boyfriend to break up because you realize you're too much of a fucking mess to give to a relationship, but then you tell him that you don't feel like life is worth living if you can't sing because it's not just something you do, it's IN YOUR SPIRIT, IT'S WHO YOU ARE, so he hangs up on you because you're not allowed to say you think about suicide and still be his friend. He's one of the best people you've ever had the pleasure of meeting, but now he just wants nothing to do with you at all. You're not ALLOWED to be suicidal!

Meanwhile, your mom is nasty to you because you constantly tell her you wish you were dead, when instead she should be consoling you.

I don't have any plans to kill myself at the moment because I KNOW that whatever I would do wouldn't work, just like swallowing a bottle of muscle relaxants didn't work, just like it didn't work for the kid in the "support" group I used to go to who jumped off the Tappan Zee Bridge and wound up surviving with beautiful new spinal injuries. So NO, folks, there's no need to call the fucking cops.

I am just sick of everyone telling me that I'M the person who doesn't deserve anybody because look at me, I'm the person who needs friends and consolation more than ANYONE right now! If you care about me, DON'T BE MAD AT ME BECAUSE I FEEL THIS WAY. TRY INSTEAD TO CONVINCE ME NOT TO FEEL THIS WAY!!!!

Do I have ANY friends out there? At all?