I've become very lazy. A little too lazy in fact. I was working out hard before the wedding, was going to see my therapist regularly, and seemed to have things in order and the sun was starting to shine in my day, but then all of that fibroid hub-bub happened and I just slide into a state of whatever. I sort of dealt with depression before, by sort of I mean I admitted I was experiencing something, started a little meditation practice but that was about as far as that got. Well guess what? It doesn't just magically go away.
To boot, I have been prone to back, neck and general joint pain for much of my life, and when you hurt for a long time, you just sort of become passive about it except when it flares up (I suppose emotional stuff is the same). While I was sitting on my butt recovering, I slouched a lot. I had a hard time finding positions to sit and lay down in with the incisions, so I wasn't very kind to my spine and it told me about it. Even with seeing a massage therapist every other week, my back and neck continue to tell me all about it.
I used to see a chiropractor for many years, but found that my pain was never really getting better, and I was only gaining short term relief. Yes, yes he'd asked me how much exercising I was doing and if I had reduced my stress, and my usual answer was 'not much' and 'no'. I casually tossed his advice aside because I was young and my body would recover (and I was dumb).
Well, Eric is getting tired of my complaints and me not doing anything about my pain, so I FINALLY saw a doctor and asked for a referral to Physical Therapy, and after a long wait my appointment came around this week. (ok, so spousal nagging is needed sometimes!)
Surprise! He said that although I'm very flexible for my age (which I didn't agree with, but whatever, I still think I'm a 10 year old gymnast) that the muscles around my spine and neck are very weak. That the most effective and important thing for me to do is to strengthen them. He gave me a number of ball exercises, I'm to do all the yoga I want (since that seems to help), AND I have to do cardio at least 3 times a week. He said the rock climbing sounds like an excellent activity to build core strength as well, but I have to be aware that I'm not arching my back (I guess I do that more easily then keeping it straight which is how he thinks I tweaked the muscles in my back).
Even though I was all bummed about gaining weight since my surgery, and I'm planning on starting a pact with a friend to no junk eating for at least 30 days, I'm having a tougher time processing that I need to fit in time to work out. But if I want to get in shape, loose weight, and not be in pain anymore, I guess I actually have to get off my duff and work out too. I mean, that is why I joined the gym right? (and no I haven't gone since that first day, but I've been sick - cough cough) Plus, exercise had been the key to keeping depression at bay in the past, so hopefully it'll do the trick again this time. (grumble grumble)
I suppose I should go find that ball now.
Oh and the new template? I was trying out the "easy" changing of the template feature in Blogger, and I forgot to save my old template so I guess I am stuck with this one until I have time to muck around with the code. As a warning to any other Blogger user who wants to play with their template... there is a bug right now that errors if you try to edit the template via the "Edit Template" section. So the only changes you can make are with the widgets and applying the stock templates. Weee!
5 comments:
Hey Girl...I'm in the same lazy boat as you...I'll talk about it more on my blog...eventually...but I'm in - I'll do the exercise and eating good with you too...I've got some weight to lose to be back to a half-ass healthy feeling and then the hard work really starts. I'm hoping to lose 10 lbs by the time i visit the Honey in Feb. As a matter of fact...Spencer is dragging me off to the exercise room in a few minutes when it opens.
I hate that exercise isn't as fun and easy as we want it to be....I mean, you enjoy hiking a lot, so why can't you go hiking 3 days a week? WORK. See, the problem is all work. Though to be honest, these two weeks I've been off of work, I've exercised almost not at all, and when I am at work I take the time out of my day more readily. Odd, huh?
So sucky that you're having so much pain. Exercise really is key to so many things, I think. Sigh.
Good luck with the exercise... the important thing is to find something you really love to do (which I have, but unfortunately with my cough now taking on gargantuan proportions, I've been away from the gym for 3 weeks!). It will really help with your pain and strength of your muscles though... you'll be amazed once you really get into it.
And I noticed that you're rock climbing too -- good for you!!! That looks like such fun, Ian is good at it, I've never tried, I'm too afraid of people oggling and laughing at me from below. It's fun to do stuff with your partner, as a couple. Bonus.
Happy new year to you and Eric too!
It seems like you're diversifying your exercise routine (Yoga and rock climbing), so that's good in that it reduces boredom.
I'm in a similar boat with my knee. My doctor told me to ride my bike more so I can strengthen the muscles around my knee. I haven't been doing it because of Xmas, crappy weather, and general laziness -- but that'll change soon.
Hope your pain subsides soon :) Do you like swimming? That's pretty easy on the body and it's relaxing (at least I think so! LOL!). When I lived in the city, my parents had a pool. I used to do 50 laps of free style and 50 laps of the breaststroke/front crawl. Hubby and I don't have a pool at our place now, so I go to the beach to swim...Except it's winter now and the water's frozen!
I was going to comment on the new blog template! :) I thought it looked different! I've been fooling around with my template and header. It's frustrating....especially when I don't have time to fix things. I just gave up and left mine as is! LOL!
Feel better soon! xoxo
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