Jonathan Oldfield Reframes 7 Arm Breaks as a Lesson in Listening to His Body

1 articles · Updated · The Guardian · Jul 8

Seven childhood breaks to Jonathan Oldfield’s right arm have led him to treat recurring pain as a warning sign, slowing down instead of pushing through discomfort.
A masseuse’s remark that the arm might be “haunted” by ancestors prompted that shift, sending Oldfield from a pub joke to a more serious reckoning with trauma and lost trust in his body.
Oldfield says he repeatedly ignored pain after each cast came off, rushing back to bikes, trampolines and sport until the injuries stopped after a final break in Paris in 2007.
Nearly 20 years later, he still feels the arm ache first when stressed, sick or afraid, and now reads that memory as a cue for caution rather than simple bad luck.
The reflection ties into his show “Exquisite Corpse,” which runs at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe from Aug. 5 to Aug. 30.

Sources

Is a comedian's arm, broken seven times, haunted by a WWI ancestor or by the physical echoes of childhood trauma?

A comic now listens to his 'haunted' arm. What can his story teach us about how our bodies remember and process pain?

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