When a Scan Gives You Information but Not the Answer You Needed

There is often a great sense of relief when a scan is finally arranged.

Sometimes that relief comes because the scan answers an important question. It identifies something that needs urgent attention or provides a clear diagnosis. It can bring direction, reassurance and a plan. But not every scan ends there.

Sometimes the report explains what can be seen, yet leaves a person with a completely different problem. They don't know what to do next. And that feeling can be far worse.

A scan gives us one kind of evidence.

There is another kind that deserves equal attention: what your body has already shown you.

Perhaps you've gradually walked further over the past few months. Perhaps you've returned to gardening, carried your grandchildren, or found yourself doing something that once felt out of reach. Perhaps you've had days where you barely thought about the problem at all.

That isn't wishful thinking.

It's evidence.

Evidence that your body has already demonstrated a certain level of capacity.

Imagine someone who has been surfing twice a day for three consecutive days. Then the MRI report arrives and suddenly they're afraid to surf at all.

The scan hasn't changed the knee.

The knee hasn't changed because the report was opened.

So what has changed?

That question isn't there to dismiss the scan. Quite the opposite.

Imaging can be essential. It can identify conditions that need urgent attention, answer questions that can't be answered any other way and, for many people, provide enormous peace of mind.

But a report cannot tell you what to do with the information.

It cannot tell you what your future looks like.

And perhaps the crux of it all is this....underneath is the question that most people won't say out loud; what if I can't surf at all? The one activity that has been there during the toughest and happiest times. The feeling , the excitement of youth and freedom. Like you're flying. The place where everything troublesome melts away and new possibilities come alive again.

That is the question sitting underneath the report.

Not everyone surfs of course.

For someone else it might be playing golf, pickleball, walking the dog, working in the garden or simply getting down onto the floor to play with their grandchildren.

The question underneath it is often remarkably similar.

This is why it helps to look at the whole picture.

The scan is one piece of evidence.

What your body has already demonstrated over weeks, months or years is another.

The decisions you make from this point are strongest when they are informed by those things together.

A report tells us what is there.

It doesn't tell us what is possible.

That is something that continues to unfold through the way your body responds, the choices you make, the guidance you receive and what the evidence continues to show over time.

Perhaps one of the most important questions after any scan isn't simply, "What does it show?"

Perhaps it is,"Given everything we know now, what do we do next?"

Because understanding what has happened and understanding how to move forwards are not the same conversation. A scan may explain what can be seen.

It cannot tell you how to build confidence in the knee again or tell you how to return to surfing.

It cannot tell you when the time is right to load it, challenge it or trust it.

Those decisions come from bringing everything together.

What your body has already demonstrated.

And what it continues to demonstrate over time.

The report is not the end of the story.

It is the beginning of the next chapter.

The chapter where the question is no longer,

"What's wrong?" and instead "How do I move forwards from here?"

Because sometimes a scan can leave you feeling like you're in the middle of nowhere.

But it cannot tell you who you are or what you are capable of. We don't absorb that information, encompass it into our entire being and close the book. No Sir.

This is where we take that piece of information and build from there.

One piece of evidence does not set the present or future in stone. This is where we pivot with what matters to you and where you want to go. It's the beginning of learning how to connect it all together and give us direction towards the future.

Anne-Martine Dicke, (AMD)

Founder of AMDtherapie

How to respond differently: - © Shift the Field