Ep. 15: Overcoming Skepticism and Doubts Around Holistic Injury Recovery with Jerry Sever

0:00 – excerpt from the episode
1:17 – intro (listen to discover a little more about your host. Martin will tell you a new lesser-known fact about Dr. Maya)

1:52
Dr. Maya Novak:
Healing any kind of injury can be challenging. There are many ups and downs and anything in between. Sometimes you're wondering “How will I get from where I am right now to where I want to be?” It’s not easy, especially when on top of the physical challenges we add the psychological ones that always come along. Today I invited someone special who isn't an expert of healing per say – but he has personal experience with injuries and healing... and he lives with me – my husband Jerry. You might be wondering why I invited him. Great question! You know, when we met, he was kind of dismissing the idea that physical symptoms are connected to emotional turmoil and/or mental one. But over the years this changed and I think this will be a great insight for you (and for me as well) of how you get from point A to point B and on the way evolve and change. So, honey, welcome.

3:01
Jerry Sever:
Thank you. I am really glad that I can join you today.

3:06
Dr. Maya Novak:
I'm really glad as well. And, you know, we've been together for almost 13 years now and it's one thing observing this growth over this period of time and then talking about it in 1 hour. So I think that I might potentially learn something new about you. I don't know.

3:27
Jerry Sever:
Let's see.

3:28
Dr. Maya Novak:
Let’s see. [chuckles] Now let's start off with your story, with your background, with how you were growing up and what kind of beliefs you acquired along the way, and what were you thinking about injuries, about healing as a child and as, I guess, a young adult. I mean you're not old now. [chuckles]

3:51
Jerry Sever:
Thank you. [chuckles]

3:51
Dr. Maya Novak:
But you know what I mean. [laughs]

3:53
Jerry Sever:
Yes. So I guess we should probably start by mentioning that my mom is a doctor. So I grew up exposed to that and I grew up with the fact that whatever happens - you get sick, you get hurt - you have a doctor right there in your family.

4:15
Dr. Maya Novak:
Very handy.

4:16
Jerry Sever:
Yes, very handy for anything that happens to you, but that obviously means that I grew up right within that box of standard medical approach. Even though I do have to say that my mom - must have been more than twenty years ago now - she got into homeopathy as well. To the point where she's now the president of the national homeopathic association.

4:46
Dr. Maya Novak:
In Slovenia.

4:46
Jerry Sever:
In Slovenia, correct. And so that sort of expanded my views on healing a little bit, but I did still approach it mostly from that standard way of thinking, Which is, you know. you get hurt - you put a bandage on it, you put a cold compress, you rest for a while, and then it gets better.

5:13
Dr. Maya Novak:
Yeah, it's kind of the same as what was happening with me in the hospital right? So here is the plan “We're going to do the surgery (if we decide to do it) and then you're going to have surgery, you're going to go home. You're going to wait and come back in 3 weeks.”

5:29
Jerry Sever:
Exactly. Yeah.

5:30
Dr. Maya Novak:
So that was kind of the approach. And what about in regard to beliefs, specifically? In regard to what your body is capable of, or looking beyond just the physical, or anything like that?

5:45
Jerry Sever:
Well, not so much of looking beyond the physical. Although my mom does have pretty broad spiritual beliefs.

5:55
Dr. Maya Novak:
Mhm.

5:56
Jerry Sever:
I did get my aura measured when I was a child, and did have some energy therapies as well. I also got some acupuncture done when I was a teenager and I had some issues with my knees. But still, in general, we kind of took the regular, standard approach to healing. Which is, there's an outside cause of an injury and you treat it mechanistically. And then, as you also said, you wait for your body to mend itself, and that's about it. Even though after she added homeopathy to her repertoire we went from taking a pill - although she was never very big on pills, either antibiotics or painkillers - but we wouldn't put a cold compress on the sprain, we would put a homeopathic ointment, and then we would take some Arnica, and that would then help with the healing.

6:59
Dr. Maya Novak:
Yeah. So you mention a few alternative approaches that you also experienced growing up, like acupuncture and a few other things. Do you think that that was also the reason why, bit by bit, over this period of time, this decade, you also became a bit more open to the idea of what I am teaching, of what I am sharing? Or do you think that that didn't have any kind of impact?

7:32
Jerry Sever:
I would say that it's certainly laid the foundation. Because I would see my mom doing that and obviously I was influenced by her way of thinking. Now, on the other hand, my dad is a natural born skeptic. So I'm still not sure whether he believes that homeopathy actually works or not, even though it's been helping him for the last three decades. [chuckles] I'm pretty sure that, as I said, the things that my mom was into prepared me for...

8:08
Dr. Maya Novak:
For your wife. [laughs]

8:12
Jerry Sever:
[laughs] Prepared me to have a broader view of things. Yes, but it definitely wasn't the main reason why I could expand.

8:22
Dr. Maya Novak:
Yes. And I have to say that when we met, you actually introduced homeopathy to me. I was never a really big pill taker or anything like that, but homeopathy wasn't really present where I was growing up. So that was something one of the first things that you introduced me to, and when I had my fractured ankle and while was recovering, your mom also gave me something, or told me what I should be taking for mending the bones. Do you recall what it was? Because I don't.

9:03
Jerry Sever:
I think bones are Symphytum.

9:08
Dr. Maya Novak:
Okay, we're going to check and put it into the show notes.

9:10
Jerry Sever:
Any homeopathic doctors listening to this, please, please don't hold me to my words. And yeah, we should definitely check this for the show notes.

9:20
Dr. Maya Novak:
Absolutely. Okay, now you also had a few serious injuries before we met. Can we talk a bit about this?

9:28
Jerry Sever:
Yeah, of course. So I guess we should probably go back to my childhood for that and just go step by step. [chuckles]

9:37
Dr. Maya Novak:
[laughs] Step by step. Let's do it.

9:38
Jerry Sever:
So as a child I was constantly spraining my ankles right…

9:43
Dr. Maya Novak:
Both of them, or one more specifically?

9:45
Jerry Sever:
Both of them. Although I think the left one took more damage. No idea why. I would just run, or go down the stairs or whatever, and my ankles would buckle and I'd sprain them to the point where I've now sort of developed this reflex that when I feel my ankle buckling, which still happens sometimes, I pretty much just drop down to save it.

10:12
Dr. Maya Novak:
And happy to say that no sprained ankle since…

10:16
Jerry Sever:
A long, long time ago. Yeah, that was also the first cast that I had.

10:23
Dr. Maya Novak:
You had a cast as well for the ankle?

10:25
Jerry Sever:
Yes, one time I sprained it so badly I needed to get a cast put on. And then as a teenager, and in my twenties, that moved up to my knees for some reason.

10:38
Dr. Maya Novak:
[chuckles] Are we going like up, up, up? Ankles, knees...

10:41
Jerry Sever:
Yeah, we're going up.

10:43
Dr. Maya Novak:
It's almost like that song, isn't it? That…

10:45
Jerry Sever:
“Head, shoulders, knees toes…” [tries to remember it and chuckles]

10:47
Dr. Maya Novak:
Yeah [laughs] Okay… we weren’t really growing up with that one.

10:51
Jerry Sever:
So I started with knee dislocations when I was I think 16., I was wind surfing and I slipped and I dislocated my right knee and then that would be my thing for the next,, like ten years. In the next ten years I would dislocate both knees - not both at the same time, thankfully -But I would dislocate one or the other with random things like wind surfing, skiing... I would ski with knee braces for a decade because of this.

11:23
Dr. Maya Novak:
Oh really?

11:23
Jerry Sever:
Yeah... skydiving stretching my legs, shaking them out... and my knee would just pop out. One time I tripped and as I fell, my knee popped out, and I had to go to the ER to to get it drained because it swole up that much.

11:40
Dr. Maya Novak:
Did you have, out of all these sprains… because it almost sounds like you had, all together with ankles and knees, like 20 of them. Did you have any physical consequences, or was something more than painful, or more, you know, troubled for you. Or was it just like “Oh, this happened again.” ‘blup’ and going back.

12:01
Jerry Sever:
What I used to think was that with all the knee stuff, my ligaments just got so loose that as I grew older and my knee would pop out, it would just pop back in, and it wouldn't even swell up that much anymore. Um, thankfully I never tore anything. Knock on wood, but I haven't had much difficulties with either ankles or knees long term. And…

12:32
Dr. Maya Novak:
Going forward… up, up… [chuckles]

12:34
Jerry Sever:
Oh, we’re gonna skip a step now, okay, because the next thing that happened to me was I had a motorbike accident. I fractured my collarbone and as you know, I still have the hardware in.

12:45
Dr. Maya Novak:
I can still feel it when I put my head onto your shoulder. Yes.

12:51
Jerry Sever:
Yeah, it's right, there. Nice, big plate holding my collarbone together.

12:55
Dr. Maya Novak:
And that was in your twenties?

12:57
Jerry Sever:
That was in my early to mid-twenties. I think I was like 25, maybe. And that one, basically I just got the surgery and then because of the way that I was living - I was living in Venezuela at the time - I didn't even go to physio or anything. I just stretched it a little bit, and six weeks later I felt that was good enough. I picked out my own stitches and I went back to skydiving.

13:27
Dr. Maya Novak:
[chuckles] A doctor's son.

13:28
Jerry Sever:
Yeah, yeah, yeah, like, I can take out my own stitches, right?

13:32
Dr. Maya Novak:
Sure. [chuckles in disbelief]

13:33
Jerry Sever:
And now going to step down. A year before we met, I broke my back on a BASE jump. And that probably sounds worse than it was, even though when it happened, that one did kind of shake me up, because I realized that it could have been worse. You know, I could have been paralyzed.

13:53
Dr. Maya Novak:
Or dead.

13:54
Jerry Sever:
Well, it wasn't that hard of a landing

13:57
Dr. Maya Novak:
Yes, but you also lost some friends because of BASE jumping and you know…

14:02
Jerry Sever:
Yeah at that point, there was...

14:04
Dr. Maya Novak:
You were single and… [chuckles]

14:07
Jerry Sever:
Not just BASE jumping, but the way that I was BASE jumping. The accident, I had it on a solo jump. So I wasn't jumping with anyone. I didn't even have ground crew that could help me when I got hurt. So I had to pick myself up and drag myself to the car and drive myself to the nearest hospital.

14:26
Dr. Maya Novak:
It was in Spain?

14:26
Jerry Sever:
That was in Spain, yeah. I was in Spain, I got to the hospital I went to the ER and said that I had a hard landing and I suspected my coccyx might be fractured. Because I'd seen those kinds of landings before and I know that this is what usually happens. So they took me to the x-ray room and they took some x-rays of my butt and my lower back and then two nurses came in with a backboard and very carefully transferred me onto a stretcher, and I thought, “Okay, so it's something a bit worse than just breaking my butt.” After that I learned that there was a compression fracture, and they kept me in bed for a week deciding whether to operate, or just put a brace on me. And in the end I just got a brace, which I think is good, because otherwise they might have fused my spine together and that…

15:20
Dr. Maya Novak:
That would be a different kind of story.

15:22
Jerry Sever:
Yeah, that would be a different kind of story. As it were, I got a brace, I was released and I got out, I healed and kept on going.

15:32
Dr. Maya Novak:
And then the sky opened and your wife entered your life and everything changed. Well, not broadly. But yeah, well I fell out of the sky, because we met that way. You were my skydiving instructor.

15:48
Jerry Sever:
That is correct.

15:48
Dr. Maya Novak:
Now, in regard to when we met - I do remember that quite often you were talking about your back and that it was painful, and that you needed to be careful, and that you couldn't do certain kinds of workouts. And my thinking back then was that, of course, if you don't have a lot of strength in your core, then this is going to also be impactful. So do you remember how I was a bit like your personal trainer at the beginning?

16:22
Jerry Sever:
Yeah, I remember that very well.

16:25
Dr. Maya Novak:
[chuckles] Probably you're remembering it very well because in those few minutes when we had those workouts, I really wasn't your friend, right?

16:34
Jerry Sever:
Let's just say that I have some childhood trauma around trainers and phys ed teachers. I was not a very sporty kid at all. So yeah, you pushing me to work even harder, that was pushing all the wrong buttons, but it did help.

16:56
Dr. Maya Novak:
And we survived.

16:58
Jerry Sever:
We survived. My back got stronger. My knees got stronger as well, because I don't know if you remember, but one time my knee actually popped out when I was warming up for one of our workouts.

17:10
Dr. Maya Novak:
I think I recall it. Yes, and I was a bit more worried than you were. You were just like, “Hey, you know it goes right back.”

17:16
Jerry Sever:
Yeah, you basically taught me that if you strengthen up a body part, it is gonna be less prone to injury. It's also gonna hurt less because it's got the muscles to support it.

17:32
Dr. Maya Novak:
Yeah, and back then, that was just a couple of years, or a year after I did my certification as a fitness instructor. So I was very fresh. “Okay, now I have a client. Here are the workouts. Let's do it!” Even though I did already have that insight, and I was very interested in the mind-body and mind-body-spirit connection. And you remember how that went. I mean, as I said at the beginning, you were kind of dismissing this idea of physical symptoms of emotional or mental turmoil. But before we go into this, I want to ask you; how did you see these two - let's just focus on the two latest injuries, so collarbone and your back. How did you see those injuries back then? Were you thinking of accidents and it being just a physical thing and that's it? Or were you thinking broader as that, and if there was something more to this beyond just the physical?

18:45
Jerry Sever:
So, no, in a word. Nope. [chuckles]

18:48
Dr. Maya Novak:
That sums it up. Okay, next question [laughs]

18:51
Jerry Sever:
With my background, or what I described of my growing up. For all the things that my mom was doing besides the standard western medicine, she never really got to a point where she would view events or injuries as anything else, but just things that happen. Even though I think that the back injury may have saved my life, because it made me slow down a little bit.

19:21
Dr. Maya Novak:
And then you met your wife, and we had a conversation. [laughs] I didn't want to have a boyfriend who I wouldn't know if he's coming back or not from a jump. You recall that conversation...

19:36
Jerry Sever:
I do recall the conversation. But to get back to the question. No, I didn't really view those events as anything than just accidents. That collarbone was caused by me riding the motorbike while drunk, if I'm being honest, at night, and doing stupid things.

20:00
Dr. Maya Novak:
In Venezuela...

20:02
Jerry Sever:
In Venezuela. And the landing accident was because I made a mistake as my parachute opened, and then I salvaged it as best as I could, but still not good enough to walk away without any injuries.

20:17
Dr. Maya Novak:
But let me ask you this: when you were recovering from those injuries, were you thinking beyond just the physical part? Like I need to do some stretches, as you described with your collarbone, or were you also back then already open to the idea that it might be good to think about emotions or psychological stuff?

20:43
Jerry Sever:
No, again. [laughs]

20:44
Dr. Maya Novak:
Sums it up, again. [laughs]

20:46
Jerry Sever:
I definitely wasn't thinking very far beyond the physical. I mean, with the collarbone, not at all. Even though, if I look back now, I realize that by being very stubborn, and by focusing on recovering as quickly as possible and getting back in the air - because I was working as a skydiving instructor then, and being grounded because of injury meant that I wasn't making money - so I just had that motivation. I had that, I had my very stubborn character, and I was in my early twenties, so I had that working in my favor.
And with my back, one thing that I did about my back was, again I was very determined to get better.

Especially because after everything, when I was released from the hospital, I was told, “You know, your back will probably hurt for the rest of your life. At least when it rains. And you probably don't want to. get back to skydiving or any sort of impact activities.” And I was very determined to prove them wrong.

21:59
Dr. Maya Novak:
To prove them wrong.

21:59
Jerry Sever:
Yeah, exactly. So again, I had that motivation. But I also just did a little bit of research into supplements that I could be taking. Which was super basic. Considering what I know of supplements now, I could have done so much more. At that point I basically just started taking calcium with Vitamin D.

22:22
Dr. Maya Novak:
But you were also a huge coffee drinker.

22:26
Jerry Sever:
Yeah, a coffee addict, and that's what I'm getting at. So I stopped drinking coffee because I learned that coffee would leach calcium from the bones. Which when you're healing a fracture is definitely not what you want. So I basically stopped drinking coffee overnight. And I remember this one time when I was still wearing this back brace, I was out with my mom and a friend of hers, and they were having coffee and I had some tea, and my mom mentioned that, “You know, he stopped drinking coffee because of his back fracture,” and her friend seemed very impressed by that and said, “Wow, it must take some strong will to just quit coffee overnight.” And I thought, “Well, no.” I mean, it's bad for my health. If I kept drinking coffee, my back wouldn't heal as well. So it's completely logical to me that I would stop.

23:21
Dr. Maya Novak:
In that regard we are pretty similar. Because whenever I also read something that can negatively impact my life, and I was doing it up to that point, I can decide overnight that I'm changing that’s that. But yes, probably she was impressed because usually coffee or caffeine addicts, they have withdrawal symptoms and migraines. So you know, if you are going from, I don't know how many cups of coffee...

23:51
Jerry Sever:
I mean, I wasn't a super big coffee addict, but I would probably take three cups per day. And so that was probably the extent of my going beyond just a very strict, standard medical approach to healing - to add some supplements and to quit drinking coffee.

24:15
Dr. Maya Novak:
Done! [laughs]

24:16
Jerry Sever:
Done. [laughs]

24:16
Dr. Maya Novak:
Now, how are you viewing your injuries now in 2023, after 13 years with your wife? Are you seeing those injuries in a different kind of way or not?

24:31
Jerry Sever:
I don't know if I see anything different about my collarbone injury. Again, it was just a stupid drunk thing that I did. And maybe it was supposed to be a wakeup call. Although I’m sorry to say it didn't really work at that point

24:50
Dr. Maya Novak:
You needed to break your back. [jokingly]

24:52
Jerry Sever:
Well, no. I needed a few more years, but the back injury, as I said, that one did slow me down a little bit. It also kind of changed the trajectory of my life. Because it also meant that it led to us meeting.

25:08
Yeah, well, someone was looking down from above, and said, "Look, you're not going to meet her unless you do something stupid." [chuckles] Let me ask you this about when you were recovering from your back injury, because those guests that have personal experience with any kind of injuries, I do ask them about how difficult it was for them, but not necessarily the physical sense. But what was the hardest thing for you emotionally or mentally, if you recall?

25:43
Jerry Sever:
About the healing process?

25:45
Dr. Maya Novak:
Yes, because a broken back is not something that takes two weeks and we are done. It's a long process and over that time, there are challenges. Physical, but also other challenges. What was the hardest thing for you?

26:01
Jerry Sever:
I think the big physical challenge for me was that I wasn't allowed to lift things and it was really hard to remember that at times. Just being very careful about the way that I was moving, because it’s unlike a broken leg, where you know that you're not supposed to step on it, and if you do it's going to hurt. So if you have a cast or a moonboot on, you're constantly reminded of that. Sure, I was wearing a brace, but I wasn't really feeling much pain in in my back, or at least at the fracture site, so it was a bit of a challenge to just take it easy.

26:45
Dr. Maya Novak:
Now you're talking about the physical challenges. Were there also any psychological challenges for you, or you don't recall that because it was so long ago?

26:56
Jerry Sever:
I don't think I actually had many or any psychological challenges. But I think that may also be because I was very aware of what could have happened, right? I'd been around action sports for over a decade, and you get very close to injuries. You know what can happen, and that was the thing that I kept repeating at the hospital. I remember when the doctor came in to tell me that my back was broken, and she was a nice middle-aged lady who very visibly felt sorry for me, and I was just lying there smiling and I told her, “Look, but I can wriggle my toes. It's really not as bad as it could be, and from what you're saying there's no spinal nerve damage. It's gonna heal. So I'm just going to take that and I'm gonna get through it.”

27:50
Dr. Maya Novak:
That's a great outlook. I mean, to look for the best thing in something that actually is not that good. It's not thinking, “Oh now, I'm going to be in in this brace for how many months...”

28:08
Jerry Sever:
If I recall correctly I wore the brace for 8 weeks because, um, this is an example of the stupid things that I was capable of

28:19
Dr. Maya Novak:
You’re going to say something again… [holds her head and chuckles]

28:21
Jerry Sever:
Okay, yeah, so 3 three months to the date after my accident, I did my next BASE jump just to prove that I could. So it just goes to show how much I've grown over the years that we've been together, I would say. [chuckles]

28:35
Dr. Maya Novak:
[laughs]

28:37
Jerry Sever:
But really, the time that I spent in the brace. I guess that if I took that as something that was holding me back, I would have felt much differently about it. But because I just knew every day - and after I got out of the hospital I just started moving as much as I could – I would go for walks, and even though I walked with the brace and I walked slower, I was just grateful for being able to walk. I think that really helped me.

29:08
Dr. Maya Novak:
Now the big question: when did this start to change? Not the outlook on that you just described. This is amazing and I am so happy for you and I'm also happy for me because this is really how it goes in our relationship. Even when I have down moments, you are always, always finding something positive. Even when I cannot see it. Because it is very simple to see things that are good when you are in a good mood, when you are in a good mindset. But when you are in those dark moments, it is harder, so you are kind of special.

29:49
Jerry Sever:
Thank you.

29:51
Dr. Maya Novak:
Now in regard to when did this start to change... You know what I mean?

30:00
Jerry Sever:
When I started changing my beliefs and approach to healing?.

30:04
Dr. Maya Novak:
Exactly…

30:04
Jerry Sever:
I would say when I met you, definitely, I remember it was probably the first year that we were together and you got into Louise L. Hay, or maybe you were familiar with her before...

30:16
Dr. Maya Novak:
I had her book before we met, and I was reading it and it really resonated. And I remember how I showed you the book, with all those symptoms and what they mean in regards to the emotional stuff, and then there are also affirmations. But I remember how dismissive you were. Because you took that book, and of course you weren't just like, “Oh that's nonsense,” but you took it, you went away to another room, and I think it took 10 minutes and then you came back, and you were like, “This is BS.” Because you looked through all of these things that could be connected, and everything seemed the same, so you can just be saying the same thing over and over. That's what I remember.

31:05
Jerry Sever:
I remember reading through that long list of symptoms and the body parts, and what they mean and what it seemed to me was that it all came down to, you know, either you're angry, you're resentful, or you're sad, or you're afraid. And then that is linked either to your thumb, or to your back, or to your knee...

31:28
Dr. Maya Novak:
Well, it wasn't that simple.

31:32
Jerry Sever:
That's how I saw it then, right.

31:32
Dr. Maya Novak:
That’s how you saw it – fair.

31:33
Jerry Sever:
And to be completely honest, I still don't quite align with what Louise Hay kind of proposes in that book. Which is, I don't think, or at least to me, it makes more sense that each person has their own flashpoints in the body, if you will. Areas or parts of the body that for whatever reason are where certain things, like certain emotional things will express themselves. So for me, this has often been the back or the core, middle parts of my body. For someone else it might be the knees, like for me in my teens, or the shoulders, or the elbows or whatever. So that's what makes sense to me.

32:26
Dr. Maya Novak:
But may I challenge you here?

32:29
Jerry Sever:
You always do.

32:30
Dr. Maya Novak:
I always do. [laughs] Because potentially, you are talking about the same thing. Because I think that you do agree, but correct me if I'm wrong, that when we don't process emotions in a healthy way they get stored in the body. And there they are creating these potentially physical symptoms, and when something goes wrong, this flares up?

32:56
Jerry Sever:
Yes.

32:57
Dr. Maya Novak:
So this, in a way, for me, how I see it, is kind of the same thing as what you were describing before.

33:05
Jerry Sever:
It is very similar, but to give you an example. I know that for you, stress often expresses itself in stiffness in the upper back, like across your shoulders, right?

33:19
Dr. Maya Novak:
Well, that is kind of what it was in the past when we were fighting, if you recall.

33:27
Jerry Sever:
Right.

33:27
Dr. Maya Novak:
So it was that shooting pain when I was getting really angry with you, and I probably didn't know how to express myself in a way that you would understand. And I was so frustrated, and I was screaming out loud, and usually that ended up with me hurting myself by then having a stiff neck. But I don't know if you've noticed that in the last years I'm not suffering that anymore.

34:02
Jerry Sever:
You're right. Yes, that's true. But what I was getting at was that the stress for you was expressing itself in your upper back.

34:11
Dr. Maya Novak:
And my stomach.

34:12
Jerry Sever:
And your stomach. And for me, it would go to my lower back. So very, very similar trigger, but expressing itself in a different part of the body. So that's where my opinion kind of differs from Louise’s, which is that not every person will feel or will get the same emotional symptom expressed exactly in the same area of the body. Even though if we get back to your upper back or my lower back, the reason why it's a flashpoint almost certainly has to do with my character and my underlying psychological issues. My lack of core strength that I have been working on for the last fifteen years, so to speak. By that I mean core strength as in character. And that expresses itself on the physical level. So whenever I have another emotional symptom looking for an outlet, it's going to go for that weakened area of my body if that makes sense.

35:17
Dr. Maya Novak:
Yes. I still think that potentially we are talking about the same thing. You are just seeing it from a different perspective.

35:23
Jerry Sever:
Quite possible.

35:24
Dr. Maya Novak:
You know, it's almost like that picture where 2 people are standing in front of each other and one is seeing 6 and the other one is seeing 9, and they are arguing. Well, we are not arguing, but it's almost like, “No, it's 6 - No, it's 9,” but basically it's the same thing.

35:40
Jerry Sever:
It’s quite possible that we're just talking about the same thing from two different points.

35:46
Dr. Maya Novak:
[laughs] Should we move forward?

35:37
Jerry Sever:
Yes. [chuckles]

35:37
Dr. Maya Novak:
What do you think, when you were growing, changing and evolving - during this process, what were the biggest obstacles or potentially one obstacle on this way of this change?

36:04
Jerry Sever:
So I did mention my dad being very skeptical by nature, almost to the point of being a natural born cynic. And I got a lot of that from him, but tempered by my mom's openness.

But also, I'm a very, very left-brained, rational person. And so that means that if I can't - or I would prefer to speak in the past here because I do want to acknowledge that I have grown somewhat - but if I can't really, if I couldn't create some sort of rational explanation or find a logical explanation for something, it would be much harder for me to accept or internalize it. So for example, if I go back to Louise, or what I just explained, that that was my rational explanation of the same thing that you were talking about there. So that that I think was probably the biggest obstacle for me.

37:09
Dr. Maya Novak:
And how did you overcome that?

37:10
Jerry Sever:
With your help. [chuckles] No, but seriously...

37:14
Dr. Maya Novak:
[laughs] I mean, thank you? But let's talk about you...

37:18
Jerry Sever:
No, I think we do have to talk about you here, because we got together and I got exposed to your influence and then I got to witness your recovery from that ankle fracture, and be a part of it, and...

37:33
Dr. Maya Novak:
So how was that for you?

37:35
Jerry Sever:
The entire experience?

37:37
Dr. Maya Novak:
Yes, I mean since you just mentioned that it was a bit of a help in this growth. How did you experience it and what kind of changes or switches or maybe aha moments you got out of it?

37:51
Jerry Sever:
So I told you that I was very close to injuries. I mean, I have a pretty good grasp of all the different ways that the body can get broken from the sports that I was doing. And so I was aware that ankle injuries, ankle fractures, for example, can be really, really difficult. Like, life-altering injuries that can leave people limping or with fused ankles or whatever for the rest of their lives...

38:23
Dr. Maya Novak:
And I got one of the worst...

38:27
Jerry Sever:
Yeah, even before we learned all the details, I remember that first hour at the medical center when the doctor or the nurse came back with your x-rays and she said, “Well, I'm sorry, this is not a sprain. It seems to be a fracture.” My heart just dropped there because I remembered all of the things that I had already read about ankle fractures, and it just felt like such a terrible, terrible injury to have.

38:57
Dr. Maya Novak:
Well you kept it together very well, because I did not feel or see any of that that, or that you were super worried. I mean, you were worried, of course. But I didn't get any of that from you.

39:13
Jerry Sever:
Yeah, that might be that positive outlook that I have. But also...

39:19
Dr. Maya Novak:
…you still have another leg, so you’re going to be fine... [laughs]

39:23
Jerry Sever:
[laughs] No - but I also felt that - you know that we did discuss this as well after your injury, that there was probably no benefit in sharing all the horror stories with you.

39:36
Dr. Maya Novak:
Yes, because you were searching and looking.

39:40
Jerry Sever:
I did look things up on the internet. You know that's the curse of someone with a brain like mine. You want to learn as much as you can about whatever happened to you.

39:50
Dr. Maya Novak:
Yeah, but we had an agreement, because I put myself in this protective bubble. Because I knew that if I look into stuff and I see something negative this is going to plant the seed in me that then is going to grow. So we had an agreement that whatever you find, you don't share with me, because I want to stay in my happy universe with unicorns and rainbows, hearts, and so on. But really, for me, it was, "Well, I have to take care of myself, and to take care of myself I need to stay in a positive state of mind. And if I start reading about all the horrible stories, it's not going to help me." And so you kept that away from me for, I don't know, a year or two. I don't know when I asked you but it was way, way, way past that point.

40:51
Jerry Sever:
And I was also there for that moment when your surgeon started explaining all the worst case scenarios with an injury like yours. And we asked them, "What about the best case scenarios?" And I saw his confusion. And you know, that was also a bit of an eye-opener. Because if you have someone who's supposed to take care of you and make you better, and they're telling you about all the things that could go wrong... Yes, obviously it's their job to prepare you for the eventualities. But if by doing their job, they're just preparing you for negative things, they're actually doing you a disservice.

41:34
Dr. Maya Novak:
Yeah, so it was probably interesting for you to be just an observer of this whole situation.

41:38
Jerry Sever:
Oh, yeah.

41:38
Dr. Maya Novak:
Because it wasn't something happening with your body. But having these aha moments and observing this. It was a bit of a switch.

41:47
Jerry Sever:
Of course. And the way that you were determined to do that triathlon, and how you worked towards it, that really opened my eyes to everything that is possible beyond just the the physical way of healing.

42:06
Dr. Maya Novak:
Yes, well, I definitely approached my healing in a holistic and way broader aspect. So yes, we were going through it together, because you were driving me 3 hours every three weeks from Wanaka to Dunedin for the checkups. But I was doing so much more. You know, we went together to hell and back with my past traumas, with my childhood traumas, with all the things that I believed were important to resolve because this was then going to give me more relaxation. Help me be in a more relaxed mode, because otherwise, if you are dealing with the physical challenges and then dealing with all those things that haven't been resolved yet, you're just having to do all those things together. And I don't think that minus and minus in this case can give you something very positive.

43:01
Jerry Sever:
Of course.

43:01
Dr. Maya Novak:
Yeah, so since you mentioned that it was interesting for you to observe how I approached my recovery, can we talk a bit about the last two things that you were doing. And that is preparing yourself for the marathon and also the 10K swim race. And what I would love to get into is how you approached this and how this affected your body. Would that be ok?

43:35
Jerry Sever:
Okay, yeah, that would definitely be okay, although it's probably just going to serve as proof that I'm not completely beyond doing the occasional very stupid thing. But as you mentioned, four years ago I decided to do a marathon. Which was in a way dealing with a childhood trauma for me, because I had a lot of unresolved issues around running. I was pretty much of the mindset that I did not know how to run. And so during the year that I was training for that marathon, I had to get past that, and not just work on my endurance or on my technique, but actually resolve the issues that I had around running. But I also approached it as this challenge, this obstacle that I needed to attack. So even though I learned how to run and I learned how to actually enjoy running, and I did finish that marathon, the damage that I did to my body… You may remember that a few months after the race, when I was kind of getting into running again, my back just locked up. And that was because I was just pushing myself too much during the marathon training, and not being mindful of what my body was telling me. And I can draw a parallel here with the swim training, which wasn't that hard on my body, but both of the coaches that I worked with kind of said the same thing to me when I was asking them about what sort of cross-training I could be doing to support myself in either the running or the swimming. My swim coach basically said, "Well, you know, the best way to get better at swimming long distances is to swim a lot." And my running coach pretty much told me to just run, so very similar. You just have to run, you have to put the miles in, and that's where I regret not listening more to my intuition which was telling me that and you, yes. [chuckles]

45:50
Dr. Maya Novak:
You saw my face. [laughs]

45:52
Jerry Sever:
Yes [chuckles] And just, you know, replace one or two running or swimming sessions per week with either the gym or yoga to stretch, or to just strengthen, not just one muscle group, but the muscle groups that are most involved in that particular movement. Because with running, yeah, I worked on my legs. But because it was just putting in the miles, my back and my core were not as strong as they could have been, and my pelvis got kind of over tilted. And that led to back problems which I've only now, like three and a half years after the race, been able to somewhat resolve.

46:41
Dr. Maya Novak:
Yeah, you know sometimes I do wish, "Oh, if he just listened more often." But one thing that you said that is so important to repeat is you said, "I was attacking it. I needed to fight." It was of course dealing with stuff from your childhood, but all this attacking and fighting and this kind of approach to achieving something cannot have really great results or a great impact on the physical body. So I am not surprised that your body responded the way it responded. And for me it was also a bit difficult, because I knew that it might be a good thing for you to add something or start thinking differently. But sometimes when you are watching your loved ones, and if they are not listening, or if they just have this mindset of, "This is the goal. This is what I'm doing," you just have to let it go, and be just like, "Okay, then do it, and whatever happens happens with your body."

48:02
Jerry Sever:
Yeah, sometimes the only way that you really learn is…

48:06
Dr. Maya Novak:
…through pain.

48:07
Jerry Sever:
…through pain! [chuckles] But yeah, just to sum it up. I think that especially the marathon, but the swimming as well, was that the mistake that I made there was that I was unbalanced.

48:24
Dr. Maya Novak:
Would you say that you were unbalanced just physically, or would you say that you were unbalanced in other ways, too?

48:29
Jerry Sever:
I mean yes, it was a physical imbalance that caused the pain. But the balance that I'm talking about is - so you mentioned that attacking right? Going in with a very, very determined attitude to get something. And I think it's good to have a goal that you are working towards, but the balance that I mentioned is really the balance between knowing when to push, and knowing when to flow.

49:00
Dr. Maya Novak:
So if you could do this all over again. Would you approach it differently - running and swimming?

49:09
Jerry Sever:
Oh yes, of course. I mean, as I said I would probably, instead of running five times a week, I would be running three times a week and the other two would be split between gym and yoga. Or maybe yoga plus gym, and just making sure that my body was properly stretched, and making sure that all the muscle groups involved in that movement were properly strengthened.

49:37
Dr. Maya Novak:
So these are five days and then you still have two, and these two, would you listen to your wife a bit more? [laughs]

48:50
Jerry Sever:
I'd listen to my wife seven days a week, [chuckles] but you do need to rest as well when working out.

49:51
Dr. Maya Novak:
I'm joking a bit, but also checking to see where you're standing now. Now, if someone is skeptical of healing beyond just the physical and what I also promote and teach, and what my work is about… what would you say to someone who is skeptical about this, and how to approach this? Or maybe not even that person, maybe a medical professional. Some medical professionals are listening to this, or someone whose loved one is right now going through a recovery, but they're very skeptical. Any advice?

50:30
Jerry Sever:
So assuming they're sort of in the same headspace that I was years ago - a very, very rational person who's also somewhat of a skeptic?

50:41
Dr. Maya Novak:
Yes.

50:42
Jerry Sever:
I might tell them to read your book obviously, but beyond that, I don't know that... Sometimes growth can happen overnight. But if I just think of myself and my growth, I don't know if there's anything that I or anyone could have said to me fifteen years ago to make me completely change my mind. Possibly set me on a different path or make me see things differently? But I guess the thing that helped me the most, which I think could be helpful for a person like this, is that the way that I view this skeptical approach now is that sometimes people take it as their worldview. Like the philosophy around which everything else is based. So if I am skeptical of everything, and if there's no scientific proof for something, it means that it is not true. And I think that's a really very, very limited view. I mentioned acupuncture earlier, and like you've mentioned, right now, research is showing that meridians, which have been known to traditional Chinese medicine for millennia…

52:04
Dr. Maya Novak:
…they are now really showing that they exist. Yes, this is something that I also mentioned in Heal Beyond Expectations, the book.

52:12
Jerry Sever:
So they can now show them, or begin to explain them in terms of western science.

52:20
Dr. Maya Novak:
Yes.

52:20
Jerry Sever:
And I would say that fifty years ago, acupuncture was around, obviously but it was probably viewed as something very new-agey. And I know homeopathy gets a lot of slack because you can't prove it, and it's supposedly just placebo, and it's really easy to make fun of it. But I've seen my mom heal children - little children - I've seen her bring cats literally from the brink of death within minutes with homeopathic medicine, and I don't think that a placebo would work as well on a cat as it does on a person. So I just think that there are things which may not have enough scientific proof right now but that doesn't necessarily mean that they're not true. It may just mean that our science…

53:20
Dr. Maya Novak:
… is not evolved enough.

53:21
Jerry Sever:
Is not evolved enough to prove them. Because I think it was Arthur C Clarke, who's a science fiction writer that I used to like very much as a kid, who said that any sufficiently advanced technology would be indistinguishable from magic for us. And a few hundred years agi, everyone knew - not believed - they knew that the earth was flat and…

53:47
Dr. Maya Novak:
How about if we don't go there? [laughs]

53:51
Jerry Sever:
[laughs] Let's not go there. Anyway, what I'm trying to say is that we are always evolving our understanding of the world. Science is always evolving. So if there are things now that work, but we can't explain how they work, that might just mean that we don't have the tools, the vocabulary to explain them. But it doesn't mean that they're not true.

43:18
Dr. Maya Novak:
Yes, and if someone is right now needing a different kind of approach, if they're just waiting for the science to catch up and be able to prove some of the things, whether this is energetical stuff or emotional or mental. Even though slowly, there is more and more research coming forward in that regard, and they are, like you said, showing that things that were taught for thousands of years in the Eastern Culture and Eastern Medicine, now westerns can kind of understand them, because, "Oh okay, here we have a study, so this is really true." But sometimes we don't have time to wait for the science to catch up, because there is more to ourselves than just the physical body and just those cells and this stuff that we say is solid.

55:17
Jerry Sever:
Exactly. And I just thought of another example which is really close to my heart. And that is, less than a hundred years ago, when aviation was just getting started, it was broadly believed by scientists that the human body could not survive freefall, right? That if you threw a person out of an airplane they would either faint or they would just die. And you know I have basically made a career for myself out of it.

55:49
Dr. Maya Novak:
Yeah, how many thousand?

55:50
Jerry Sever:
Seven thousand plus skydives. I made a career out of jumping out of airplanes. So that's a very good example of how our understanding of something has evolved. And I think that would be my advice to anyone who's very skeptical, who's very rational minded, to not let yourself be blinded by that way of thinking.

56:17
Dr. Maya Novak:
Yeah, great insight. Now, if someone stopped you right now and said, "Jerry, can you tell me your number one advice when it comes to healing?" Because you went through so many injuries, so much healing and you live with your wife. What would you say? What would be the number one thing that would be a good thing for them to do?

56:45
Jerry Sever:
I probably can't say to spend 13 years with you…

56:50
Dr. Maya Novak:
Hopefully not. [laughs]

56:51
Jerry Sever:
[chuckles] But besides your book, which is kind of a condensed version of what I just mentioned.

57:01
Dr. Maya Novak:
Of 13 years… [chuckles]

57:03
Jerry Sever:
I would just say to keep an open mind about things. And to allow for the fact that we may not know everything there is to know about healing, because we don't. Our knowledge is constantly expanding, but it's not at the limit - very far from it. So keep an open mind, and know that there's definitely wisdom and benefits to the established sciences, in the established medical approach. But there's also a lot of value to complementary approaches and to a more holistic way of healing.

57:39
Dr. Maya Novak:
Are there any other aha moments that you did not mention that you got over all these years watching me, and how I work with my clients? Anything that would be good to mention or that was helpful?

58:02
Jerry Sever:
I don’t know if it was exactly aha moments, but the same thing that I said about my mom and homeopathy, and cats and children… I've seen you work with people and I've seen you help them way beyond the things that their doctors said were realistic for the kind of injuries that they have. So while those may not be aha moments, it's definitely helped me along and helped me keep my mind open about everything

58:30
Dr. Maya Novak:
I think I'm blushing. [laughs]

58:30
Jerry Sever:
[laughs]

58:35
Dr. Maya Novak:
Thank you so much. One last question, out of the box, and this is, imagine that you have an injury. And you are on a desert island and you can actually bring one thing with you that can help you heal amazingly well from this injury. What do you bring and why?

58:54
Jerry Sever:
Oh, you know what I'm gonna say.

58:56
Dr. Maya Novak:
I don't! That's why I'm asking. [chuckles]

58:59
Jerry Sever:
You're coming along. Whether you like it or not. [chuckles]

59:02
Dr. Maya Novak:
Are you going to be listening? Because I'm not coming if you're not going to be listening. [laughs]

59:05
Jerry Sever:
I'm injured. I'm gonna be listening to you 100%, yeah!

59:09
Dr. Maya Novak:
I'm biting my tongue right now because right now you're saying “I'm injured so I'm gonna be listening,” but like you said 3 years ago with swimming and running and how much you were listening and how much you did not listen… But I have to acknowledge that in the last 3 years a lot of things have changed. So potentially you might be listening.

59:33
Jerry Sever:
There you go.

59:34
Dr. Maya Novak:
Otherwise you're just taking the book… [laughs]

59:37
Jerry Sever:
Oh, if you don't want to go to the desert island with me, yeah, I'm taking your book, but I hope that you would join me.

59:43
Dr. Maya Novak:
I'm coming honey. [chuckles] Now, I mean if someone would like to contact you. This is also one of the questions that I ask the experts. But since you are not a healing expert per se, probably that question is not relevant.

1:00:00
Jerry Sever:
I think that people should just contact you for any questions about their healing.

1:00:07
Dr. Maya Novak:
Thank you for shamelessly promoting my work, right?

1:00:11
Jerry Sever:
That's what I do. I shamelessly promote my wife's work.

1:00:15
Dr. Maya Novak:
Thank you honey! Thank you. Being here, that was a great insight and I think that I got a bit extra. I learned a few things about you, especially I did know that you had so many sprains when you were growing up. That's something new. But I think it's very helpful for people who are injured who are recovering from injuries or loved ones or medical professionals. So thank you.

1:00:47
Jerry Sever:
Yeah, Thank you for having me, and I hope your listeners enjoyed this.

1:00:54
Dr. Maya Novak:
This wraps up today’s Mindful Injury Recovery Talk with my amazing husband Jerry Sever. If you haven’t done it yet, subscribe to the podcast on whatever platform you’re using to tune in, and… please leave a review so we can reach even more people who should be hearing these lessons. To access show notes, links, transcript, and video of today’s conversation go to mayanovak.com/podcast and click on episode 15. Also, on my website you can discover more about my book Heal Beyond Expectations as well as explore options of working with me – either as my private client or let me guide you through my self-paced programs. Visit mayanovak.com. Until next time – keep evolving, blooming, and healing.