The Journey

Yup, suckacious and disappointing just about cover it. I'll do what I have to to give myself the best shot at healing. I'm icing it now and will do my stretches and ice it again tonight before I go to bed. I remember last year when he said, "I don't think it's a disc. That's a good thing." compared with today's, "It looks like a bulging disc so we need to be careful." Not what I thought I was going to hear.

Pain level is down in the 3-4 range today from 10 on Thursday. Progress!

Progress indeed! 10 though.... oy.

Yeah, I was at the pass out stage trying to get to the bathroom in the middle of the night Thursday night. Wouldn't have made it without help. Spent Thursday and Friday in the 7-10 range before slowly starting to calm down on Saturday and Sunday (5-6) and yesterday after my chiro appt (3-4). Maintaining 3-4 is ok. It's defined as "tolerable, but unable to perform some activities". I never get below a 3 on my knees, whereas my back can flair anywhere from 0-10.

Just take it easy now and give your body the necessary rest. It did throw you a curve but you still can continue your diet and emphasize on that part instead of exercising. You just have a shift in priorities now, but you still can reach your goals. I do hope it will be with as little pain as possible - hang in there, JPB!

Thanks, CJ. I plan on doing just that!

Hope the progress toward lower and lower numbers continues, JPB.

Thanks, George. Tomorrow I plan on asking the chiro about using the therapy pool. It's what keeps my back, knees and hips from going crazy under normal (for me) circumstances, but he said ice and no heat for now. Gonna need to set out a plan to keep the rest of my body from squawking soon.

do they have an ice water therapy pool?


brrrrrrrrrr.

No, thank goodness!

JPB my love, oh, what a nightmare few days. I'm so glad that you've got a little control over the pain

I know how HUGELY frustrating this all is for you


keep the positive focus, do what you can not to inflame it, and please don't lift..

I would break into "Lean On Me" and allllllalalllla as I did thisavo in the car and thought of you.... heh, we could balance each other

Love you always girl - little at a time, baby steps

still with you all the way

love and gentle hugs to you, Mr B and the goils xxxx

How ya doing JPB?

x

Improving slowly.

Back from the chiro. No therapy pool until at least Monday but he's encouraged by the improvement. I'm still maintaining a 3-4 pain level but I can sleep through the night now and I have a couple exercises to start doing for back flexibility and core strengthening. I had a few light spasms this morning and a lot of stiffness but nothing major.

He also said I could start walking a bit. 5-10 mins, 1-2 times per day. That's a trip around the block which I'll start tomorrow. I also get to march in place (gently) for 5 mins and then sit on the edge of my bed and bounce for 5 mins to get the blood flowing. He actually recommended a rebounder for the marching and an exercise ball for the bouncing but I don't have either one so I'll march on carpeting and use the edge of the bed for bouncing. I'm sure the gym has exercise balls. I'll check and see if they have rebounders. If they do then I can do all of it (march, bounce, walk, back exercises) there.

Hanging in there, otherwise. Yep, leaning on and propping up here too!

((( Iz )))

Lean training!

This was kinda interesting. I put a yoga mat on the carpeting to give some extra cushion for the marching. I need to be careful that I don't favor my broken leg on one side or my back on the other side. The emphasis here has to be on "gentle" marching. The trick, I think, is to look straight ahead facing a mirror so that I can see if I'm favoring one side or the other. My back felt better than it's felt all week after completing the marching/bouncing combo.



I was able to do these without any additional discomfort. I felt pretty good afterwards. The marching/bouncing combo was a good warmup before doing the back exercises.



Just got back. It took me 12 mins to do 0.6 miles, which is a 3mph pace. I didn't have any spasms or other problems. It felt good to be outside again. I'll see how my day goes. I may do it again later this afternoon.

The intensity of my workout was about 10% of what it was before but it felt GREAT to be able to do something and not trigger new spasms or increase the pain level.

Encouraging!

Thanks for the update.

That's good to hear, JPB, but now don't overdo it just because you've had
a good day exercising lightly. On the marching, would it help if you put some of these liquid gel Dr. Sholl's soles into your sneakers? You'd have some additional gentle buffer zone then.

Thanks, Soz and CJ.

I won't be overdoing it! I just got back from my second trip around the block. It feels so nice to be outside but I knew I'd gone far enough as I rounded the final corner. Tomorrow is another day. I've gone from absolute misery and near paralysis to walking around the block twice/day in a week's time. My job now is to slowly get my strength back. I felt good after each of today's exercise components. I like that feeling!

The marching directions call for doing it barefooted. That may be because it's supposed to be done on a rebounder. Dunno... I have orthotics in my sneakers that give me good support. They (the sneakers) add a lot of weight to my step though. I think I'll stick with barefoot for the time being. I ordered an exercise ball today. Bouncing and balancing is a great thing to be able to do here at the house. Soz got one not too long ago. Are you still using it, soz?

I'd like to thank you all for keeping me propped up and helping me through this transition, especially last week's setback. I really am encouraged about the overall approach and thrilled that it seems to be working so far. Four weeks of forward progress and one week of setbacks is a pretty good overall response for my body. The food plan component is still working fine. I'm down 2.0 lbs this week so far (18.5/4.5) for a total loss of 25 lbs from my January high. I will absolutely finish this part of the journey and proceed on to the discussions with the docs.

Glad you were able to get out. You are one determined puppy. Two pounds lost despite the setback is brilliant. A tough and determined puppy.