My Vocal Injury Story

It’s March 26th of 2021 and the years of poor technique have finally caught up with me…

I fought going to an ENT to get my vocal folds scoped for weeks because I was so scared of the results.

But after 4 weeks of not being able to sing or even speak because my voice hurt so bad, I knew that just waiting around and hoping my voice would come back (like it always did up until this point) wasn’t going to solve my problem. I needed to get help.

So there I was sitting in the waiting room with numbing cream in my nostrils to make the scoping less painful, sweaty hands and a racing heart.

The nurse called me in, we did the exam (who knew that singing with a camera shoved up your nose was going to be so difficult haha!) and then went over the results together with Dr. Wood, the laryngologist at the hospital…

My worst fear came true… I had vocal pre-nodules.

At this point I thought my career was over because my voice was never gonna come back.

All I could think about was “How did I end up here?!” Honestly, looking back now I’m surprised it didn’t happen earlier…

My entire life I was a proud belter and the louder and higher the notes were the more I wanted to reach those notes too.

I didn’t care what it took to reach those notes, I just HAD to get them. So I pushed and forced my voice to do things it wasn’t ready for.

The craziest part is I thought that I sounded good! But the truth was… I was just screaming.

I remember back when I was in college for musical theater I was singing some super belty song and two girls from another class were walking by my classroom and my friend Carter overheard them saying “Oh lord, here goes Lara screaming again”. 

When he told me what he heard, I just brushed it off, telling myself that they were jealous they couldn’t belt as high and project as much as I could. 

It took me years to realize that they were in fact right and I really was just yelling on pitch.

That’s how I ended up here… at the ENT’s office… with a camera shoved up my nose.

Not caring about what singing felt like…

Doing the wrong things for MY voice…

Pushing it beyond its limits…

Ok, back to the office… I just learned that I had vocal pre-nodules and I thought my life was going to end because I would never be able to get my voice back.

But after drinking some water, getting a cold towel on my neck and taking a few deep breaths so that I won’t pass out due to sheer panic (hello drama queen 💁‍♀️), Dr. Wood explained to me that while this is a serious situation, it’s really not that bad and that with some vocal therapy and making changes to my singing and speaking, my voice would go back to normal. I

walked out of the hospital with a referral for an SLP (Speech Language Pathologist for vocal therapy) in my pocket, got in my car and just sat there for a couple minutes having a million thoughts and 0 thoughts at the same time.

I didn’t know what to think… or do… 

Now there’s one quality I possess that saved my little 🍑 here… I am not a quitter.

I refused to just give up on singing and teaching. I was determined to get my voice back on track and do anything to not end up in the same situation (or even worse) again.

So I sought out the best vocal coaches, vocal therapists and resources that I could get my hands on and got to work.

Two months later, on May 28th 2021 I went back to Dr. Wood to get another scope done and there was no sign of vocal pre-nodules anymore and my voice was healthy as can be.

Obviously that was a huge relief 😮‍💨 While getting the diagnosis of vocal pre-nodules was my worst nightmare come true, just two months later I was grateful that it happened.

Without that diagnosis I never would have changed the way I sang.

For years before the vocal injury I felt like I was standing still with my voice… Not making any progress was super frustrating so I just started to push in hopes that eventually it would get easier and my range would expand.

But it never did! It just kept getting worse.

But with everything I learned from these top coaches, therapists and resources I knew what I really needed to do to not only get my voice back to where it was before, but get it to come back stronger and more flexible than ever before.

Thanks to releasing tension, doing the right exercises and following the right techniques for MY voice I was now a better singer than ever before.

I was shocked by my progress. I had no idea that I had it within me… EFFORTLESSLY hitting these crazy belt notes and not getting tired from singing - it was like a dream came true.

I was SO happy and so was my voice, because singing finally FELT good.

Since then it has become my mission to share everything I learned through this experience with as many singers as I possibly can because nothing beats the feeling of finally making progress again and reaching goals you never thought were possible for you.

So hi, that’s me. Only making changes when being forced to 😂

No all joking aside, that’s me and how I ended up developing a personalized coaching method that focuses on releasing tension so that you can get the most out of your instrument and keep it healthy at the same time.

And part 1 of my voice lesson mini series is a glimpse into what it takes to release tension so that you'll never have to end up in the same situation as I did, but rather sing without any issues for years to come.

Check out part 1 of the mini series here.

Remember, the most important part about singing is how you feel. I promise you when you feel good, you're going to sound even better!

x Lara