Homer's Travels: Regimen Restart And Health Update

Friday, September 21, 2012

Regimen Restart And Health Update

I posted, when I suspended my exercise regime for our Asian Adventure, that I would not use this as an excuse to stop for good.  I was good to my word as I did restart my regimen when I returned.
  • I restarted my physical therapy exercises (twice a week) and my abs work (thrice a week). 
  • After a pause of over a month I played it safe and restarted the walking at five miles and am building back up to the thirteen - fifteen mile range that is my goal. 
  • I started biking twice a week. I started really slow. My first ride was only three miles or about twenty minutes on the bike. I've then upped it three miles every two weeks and am now doing nine - ten miles. I was concerned how my knee would take the biking but it has handled it wonderfully and I now consider my knee to be 99.9% healed.
The one exercise I have not restarted is push ups.   Push ups was the one exercise that I really saw benefit from doing.  When I was doing them I had no back pain and I slept better because of that.  After stopping for two months my back pain is returning.  I stopped doing them at the end of May to let what I thought was a strained tricep muscle to heal.  After a two month break I felt that it had gotten much better and didn't bother me much at all.  I tried to restart my push ups but pain returned.  There was only one thing left to do - go to the doctor.

The day I went to the doctor I woke up with a sharp pain in my right heal.  I'd experience this before on the Camino but I'd thought it had been related to my twisted pelvis.  Since the pelvis issue had been corrected by my physical therapy I was at a loss.  At the doctors I asked about the shoulder and the heal.  A few questions and a little manipulation of the two parts of my body and he had a diagnosis.  The shoulder was rotator cuff tendinitis.  The heal was heel spur/plantar fascitis.

So I went home with oral steroids and anti-inflammatory meds.  They would hopefully treat both issues.  He also suggested icing my heel/foot after walking (which I am doing) and gave me nine exercises to strengthen the shoulder that I have to do twice a day - yeah ... more exercises ... not sure I'm happy but if it's necessary ... and it's only for the next ten days or so.  That's the good news I took away from this by the way - the doctor only gave me meds for ten days expecting this to be enough to correct my conditions.  I hope his assessment is correct and I'm back to "normal" in ten days.  If not, I'm back to the doctor I would imagine.

One nice side affect of taking these meds is I have had no allergy issues.  When my allergies bother me my nose holes shrink and clog up, especially at night when I'm trying to sleep.  Since I started taking the meds I've had no problems.  I kind of dread when I'm out of pills.

I'm starting to get tire of all this.  As soon as I fix one problem (twisted pelvis, knee, back pain) other problems pop up (rotator cuff, plantar fascitis).  I know I'm not getting younger but for once I would like to get all my issues dealt with without something else getting injured, irritated, or cranky.

I'm sure you all are getting tired of me complaining about my aches and pains on Homer's Travels.  I think I'm starting to sound like a broken and whiny record.  I think I'll shelve the health and exercise labels for a while.  You're welcome.

2 comments:

  1. Oh my gosh. If it's not one thing it's another! I hope everything feels better soon so you can continue your exercise regime and feel good all over!

    Good luck buddy! In the meantime, I'd like to recommend ICE CREAM!

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    Replies
    1. Autumn, Hmmm ... ice cream. Haven't tried that for at least a week. Maybe I should try it again.

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