Time for MORE PT?

OK – So I apparently have the best blog readers ever! Thanks for all your advice getting signed up for PT. I had my first few appointments and here’s what she says: I am built very, very wrong. My spine does X, I bend from Y in one direction and Z in the other. My hips are not open or something. Basically… I’ve got a lot of work to do.

But what else? I fucked up my back ROYALLY! In my latest gym routine, I did these inverted pushups with my legs on the bench and my hands on the floor. So, ya know the part where the trainer is like “tighten your core! support your back!” and you’re all… “um… whatever.” Well, I get it now.

I think my problem came when I confused “good pain” with “bad pain”. The kind of pain that you feel when things are getting stronger vs the kind of pain when you need to say, “STOP!” I missed it, and now my back feel like the muscles are attacking themselves, all squeezing right into the middle of my back. Right now it hurts the most to sit, but for a while it hurt to lie on the floor, too. The foam roller was — is — my best friend. The euphoric *crack crack crack crack* as I rolled down the length of my spine, as I let out a near-orgasmic moan right in the middle of the stretching area.  The Physical Therapist says “try the chiropractor” but I am so skeptical of chiropractic. It seems like a quick fix… something people get addicted to. But maybe I’m wrong.

Thankfully, that’s the least of my problems as lately I’ve spent most of my time on my back. I had foot surgery on Tuesday to fix a Morton’s Neuroma in my right foot. So now, I’m not just not-running. I’m not just not-squatting-or-lunging… Now I’m not doing anything at all. I’ll start physical therapy for the surgery in 2 weeks, and I’m still in physical therapy for my knee, and my back feels like it has a vendetta against me — PT or chiropractic is in the future for that, too.

I worked really hard to get in shape. Now, I have to persevere through some pretty significant setbacks. S-U-C-K-S!!!!! I have to avoid all the pity eating that usually comes with me pitying myself because I’m not doing anything to burn the pity-calories. Gah. Crutching around seems to be showcasing my triceps pretty well :) What!? I gotta feel good about something.

Time for PT?

To Physical Therapy or Not to Physical Therapy… that is the question plaguing me today, months after being diagnosed with the most annoyingly named diagnosis ever: Runner’s Knee.

I haven’t actually run properly since… January? February? March? Sometime Q1 when I decided my knee pain really wasn’t something to just completely ignore. Since then, I have tried a veritable cornucopia of cardiovascular activities including but not limited to…

• “Power” yoga
• “Power” walking
• Spinning
• Swimming
• Elliptical-ing
• Kickboxing

All of them hurt in one way or the other and I’m getting a bit distraught. I can’t do lunges or squats, and I can’t do any cardio… That is a huge loss as far as my caloric expenditure goes since those big muscles burn so many nasty calories when you work them out properly.

I have been diligently doing my straight leg lifts and leg kick backs and all the little exercises the doc said I could do safely, but I am just not seeing an improvement.

Hence the question at hand: Do I go to PT to try and get this thing fixed the right way? Is that even the right idea? Doctor Cocky who diagnosed me said it wasn’t necessary since I went to the gym so much, but I feel like if they watched me doing the excercises, perhaps I’d get closer to fixing it sooner.

Y’all always have great advice. Bring it on. I need you.