Many musicians who suffer MFD (Musician’s Focal Dystonia) refuse to make it public, sometimes because they’re afraid of losing their job, some other ones because of lack of empathy from their colleagues, or just because they’re embarrassed to show themselves weak.

I think we should all write our own story, because the mere fact of writing it is absolutely liberating.

This is my story:

Everything started in 1990, while I was in the last year course of my guitar studies at the Royal Conservatory of Music of Madrid.

I clearly remember that I was practicing Agustín Barrios Waltz Nº 4 OP 8 full of arpeggios and scales and I noticed that I unusually failed with the index finger of my right hand.

The finger went slightly above the string I wanted to play. A few days later, no matter how much attention I put on my finger, the error became more and more pronounced, to the point that the finger, instead of reaching the desired string, curved into the string just above it. Around this time, I couldn’t understand at all what was going on. I began to fall prey to desperation and suddenly my head was flooded with fears and ghosts.

After a week, when I played with the index finger, it did not longer return with the same speed as the other fingers and other involuntary movements appeared soon.

At the same time that the index finger was curved into the palm of the hand, the middle finger extended outward without control. In a few days, the position of my right hand was completely distorted.

A silent intruder had settled into my body and controlled my hand against my will.
Panic took over myself and clouded my mind.

It took me a while to realize that the middle finger extending outward without control was just trying to compensate the index finger curling into the palm, but around this time I was not able to play a simple arpeggio.

All the dreams that it housed, as well as the enormous work done over the years, in just one month, had been shattered.

I literally felt that a curse had fallen on my head.

After a long pilgrimage of more than a year to the examination rooms of doctors, specialists, acupuncturists and all kinds of alternative physiotherapists, I only managed to get a name for what I suffered. It was no more and no less than an incurable disease called Focal Dystonia.

For eight years I believed what I had been told, until I decided, with a lot of determination and patience, to move toward my recovery. It was a work of reeducation of the movement in an extremely slow and aware way. In just under six years, my index finger worked perfectly again, but after that the symptoms appeared on the ring finger. I understood then, that in the work I had done I had left something important out: the origin of the problem.

Although this second time I counted with the advantage of my previous work, it was then, when I truly began a deep research and experimentation to dissolve that pattern that triggered those symptoms and dwelled in the emotional sphere.

Therefore, in this occasion I addressed my recovery from two different and complementary points of view. On the one hand, reeducation through Proprioception and Aware Movement and on the other hand, “Emotional Cleansing“, based on the creation of a deep state of presence and conscious observation.

Little by little, the symptoms began to fade. What was difficult to play before became easy and gradually, the movements recovered their naturalness and fluidity.

Today I want to share my personal experience with those people who may be suffering symptoms of MFD (Musician’s Focal Dystonia) and encourage them not to give up and put all their conscience at the service of their recovery.

With the proper guidance, recovering from the MFD is possible.

If I have succeeded, you can also do.