When your body is trying to tell you something…

If someone had told me two years ago that I would hear the sentences 'You won’t be able to dance anymore' and 'You’ll have to adjust your life,' I probably would have given them a very dirty look and refused to listen to what that actually meant. Today, I can say that in these past two and a half months, I’ve 'walked' a path that wasn’t easy and sobered me up.

All dancers face muscle and joint pain, injuries, and illnesses… and most come to terms with them, as they are both a part of and a consequence of a dancer’s life — of all the training and performances. But sometimes the body signals that something is much more serious and stops us in our tracks.

You won’t be able to dance anymore

"I ignored the warning signs for a long time and always found a bunch of excuses — why I couldn’t go to the doctor, why I didn’t have time to rest, and why I had to and wanted to keep dancing despite the increasingly intense pain. It started with certain movements during training and rehearsals that triggered sharp pain, which didn’t subside immediately but lasted for minutes or even hours. Then the problems began to repeat and escalate. During performances, I was afraid of what would happen if it struck in the middle of a show. Sometimes the pain paralyzed one or both of my legs to the point where I couldn’t take another step, or I collapsed and lay on the floor. At first, I was convinced it was just inflammation and that it would pass once I managed to rest a bit. But then even walking up stairs or a simple everyday drive caused pain.

"The doctor sent me for an X-ray and MRI, and the results showed that I had two cysts in my spine (Tarlov cysts), which were compressing the nerve canal. Alongside all the other changes that naturally come with aging, these two were the ones that limited me the most, and I knew they wouldn’t just disappear — especially since they were growing. The prospect of surgery was a shock to me and something I couldn’t even imagine, because it meant being absent from work, from training, and from performances — something I simply couldn’t accept. I postponed it for more than a year, until it just wasn’t possible anymore — during dress rehearsals right before performances, the pain was so severe that I lay on the stage in agony, and we didn’t know if we’d even be able to go through with the show. I knew I had to have the surgery."

"You’ll have to adjust your life"

The conversation with the specialist shattered me, mostly because it was impersonal, cold, uncompromising, and cruel to me — when someone tells you that you’ll never touch the ground with your hands again, that you might end up in a wheelchair, that you should forget about dancing, it’s like taking away a musician’s voice or their ability to play an instrument — and that brought me to my lowest point.

Dance is life to me — something I live and breathe, my world of escape, dreams, creation, and beauty. Dance is my expression, my choice, my purpose. Through it, I can be who I want to be, and through it, I help others — that’s why it’s a necessity for me.

I walked quickly to the car, crying — partly from sadness, partly from anger. I was thinking about how I had already gone through similar situations twice before with knee surgeries — they also removed cysts — and I’m still dancing. And when I was a baby, doctors told my mom I would never walk because of flat feet, and today I’m a dancer and choreographer. My stubbornness grew, and deep down I had already decided that these cysts would not take away my greatest love — dance.

I sought more opinions, and just before deciding on surgery, I found a doctor who explained everything with great empathy, listened to me, offered several options, and gave me the chance to choose a date that worked for me — calming my fears.

I was operated on by Dr. Gregor Rečnik at UKC Maribor, and all I can say to him and the staff — the anesthesiologists, nurses — is a heartfelt THANK YOU! His kindness, empathy, expertise, and professionalism are qualities of GREAT doctors. He came to see me before the surgery to explain the procedure again and reassure me, and he checked in after the operation to make sure everything was okay.

After the surgery, I had to get used to the fact that lying down and sitting weren’t exactly pleasant, and I couldn’t stand for long either, so the first days were tough. The wound was painful, and the pain was intense. Slowly, I began to progress with walking — which suited me best — and I felt that the sharp pain was gone. YAY!

The days that followed required patience and a lot of rest — something I wasn’t very good at. Since I was told I couldn’t swim, cycle, or dance, and I was going in for wound dressings and on medical leave, I had to mentally say goodbye to my summer plans. The heat and monotony became my enemies, and I couldn’t wait to get a date for rehabilitation in Zreče, where I could finally start doing exercises.

On the very first day at Terme Zreče, all of us who came for a fourteen-day post-surgery rehabilitation received therapy schedules. I was thrilled to get pool exercises, three different types of workouts, physiotherapy… up to eight therapies a day. I also met five wonderful women, and for fourteen days we struggled together in the pool and during workouts, laughed over breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and bonded deeply. In the afternoons, we kept moving in the pool and walked from the cottages to the spa, so by evening we collapsed into bed from exhaustion. I had never done so much just for myself and truly let go of everything else. Even before I arrived, I had decided to do everything they told me — and more. So instead of one pool session, I did two, wrote down all the exercises from workouts and physiotherapy, repeated them in the cottage in the afternoon, did more exercises in the pool, and sometimes even went to the gym alone for extra sessions. All of this paid off — the results were excellent, and the rehabilitation was a complete success.

Terme and the spa in Zreče, especially all the therapists who worked with us, deserve medals for their kindness, professionalism, smiles, encouragement, and all the advice and support. I learned a lot about myself, my body, its limitations, and most importantly — how to listen to it so I can stay active moving forward.

Photos: A. Podrekar

And precisely because of all this, I’m dancing again today. Yesterday, I completed my first training session, and I’m immensely grateful and happy that I can continue — and on September 11, 2025, I will dance in the fairytale performance Mišja šola at the Pikin Festival in Velenje, and on September 19, 2025, in the full-length dance production Zašto ja (Why Me) at the Vatroslav Lisinski Hall in Zagreb — both with a charitable purpose.

I want, I can, I will!