Twenty Days of Silence

My last blog post was 20 ago, and so much has happened since then. Well, OK, nothing exciting. But lots of little things. I will only write about three tonight. Deal with it.

I graduated physical therapy. After several appointments and consecutive days without pain, I had my final appointment. They didn't officially discharge me in case I need an additional appointment or two when I start running again, but I have no more scheduled appointments. As much as I enjoyed those 30-minute torture sessions, I'm happy to have a little more free time in my evenings and return to regular workouts. On that note...

Because I'm accident-prone, my therapist and I agreed it would be best for me to participate in their bridge program. Where I go to PT is actually a dance studio, a PT office, and a personal training center all under one roof. Therefore, I can start working with a personal trainer who has direct access to my PT records and my therapist, who is right there in case something starts bothering me during a session. And even better, my insurance covers $150 of the $200 fee which gets me eight 30-minute sessions or four 60-minute sessions. I opted for the eight, and my first session was supposed to be last Thursday...

Except last Thursday, I started feeling horrible. I didn't get to work until 10:30 because I felt so awful, and when I did arrive, I was soaked through my clothes in a cold sweat despite driving with the windows down in the 30-degree weather. Clearly I had a fever and had no business being at work. I wrapped up a project and left around noon, and proceeded to die for the next six days. I thought it was my 17th sinus infection, but it just kept getting worse. I had every symptom imaginable - sinus congestion/pressure, sore throat, runny nose, headache, fever, chills, fatigue, body aches, cough, no appetite. I spent the entire weekend in bed. But when I woke up on Monday, the pain was also in my chest and that worried me. So I made a doctor's appointment and fortunately it turned out to be from the coughing - my lungs were completely fine. She said I have the awful viral infection that's been going around and that antibiotics would be useless. I told to keep doing what I'd been doing - Sudafed, Mucinex, ibuprofen, cough drops, Vicks VapoRub, vaseline on my Rudolph nose, and lots of rest and fluids. I woke up this morning feeling like hell, but was finally able to get myself going.

I finally returned to work this morning at 10 (mornings are hard when you can't breathe for the first two hours after waking up). I had no itention of working the whole day but I started to feel a lot better as the day went on. I am now stuck with a runny nose, brutal post-nasal drip and thus a mucus-y cough, but otherwise feeling much much better. However, I originally rescheduled last Thursday's training session to tomorrow, but I don't want to end up sick again this weekend, so I postponed it until next Thursday. Let's hope nothing comes up then!

I normally feel really guilty when I miss work, but not this time. This is the sickest I have been in a long time, and I knew I needed to take care of myself. I can work through a cold or when I'm really tired, but this was a lot worse than that. It doesn't help that everyone has been really negative at work lately, so I honestly didn't want to go back. But I did want to feel better, so there ya have it. I am so looking forward to a four-day weekend this week. Thank you, Easter Bunny!

Speaking of the Easter Bunny, I gave up meatless Lent 10 days early. Yup. I don't give something up for Lent because I'm a practicing Catholic (I'm not anymore). I give something up because I like to test my discipline  And well, five weeks of no meat was long enough. On the first day I ate meat, I had antipasto salad and buffalo chicken. The next day, I had a gourmet cheeseburger. And the rest is history. I still don't eat meat every day (I follow meatless Mondays), and I usually eat salad for lunch, either with tuna or no meat, and I'm usually so tired by dinner I eat something small. So it's not like my carnivorousness (carnivorism?) is out of control. I just got sick of not eating meat when I like eating it, and usually make healthy meat choices. I can't wait to indulge in some bacon this weekend.

Skinnier Shins

I'm in my fifth week of physical therapy for my shin splints. They are getting better, but my therapist says the progress is slow. He tried a new taping method last night, and my legs feel pain-free for the first time in about two months, so that's awesome!

I should probably back up a little bit. When I went to Texas, I didn't work out at all. Bad Kelly! We walked a lot and I ate surprisingly well, and managed to lose half a pound. But when I got back, I did one Jillian Michaels Body Revolution workout and haven't done one since. I rode the bike once (10 miles, go me) but then exhaustion set in. I ended up feeling quite sick this past weekend and decided to listen to my body. I still ate really well and managed to walk a few miles every day with Rags, but did no weight lifting or real working out. But then something magical happened–I realized my shins felt better. So I decided to continue letting them heal, knowing that I was basically sabotaging my weight loss efforts. But at some point, you have to choose between losing weight and healing an injury. I still kept to my healthy diet and walked, and as of this morning I am down a total of 8.6 pounds–1.6 pounds since I left for Texas. So the plan is to continue to do only walking and stretching until we start seeing some major improvement in my shins.

This is what Treavor's new taping method looks like. It's on both shins. I'm also wearing these new Zensah compression sleeves almost 24 hours a day, which are helping immensely. I felt so good after leaving physical therapy last night that I went gentle yoga. It was exactly what my body, mind, and spirit needed. I'm going again tonight (as long as classes aren't canceled due to the snow), Friday, and Saturday...and hopefully every day until I can get back to my regular exercise regimen.

I signed up for a 5K this past Saturday, not realizing A. it was the day Mom and I had tickets for a gymnastics competition in Worcester and B. that I would still be forbidden from running. So I'm really hoping these babies hurry up and heal because I want to sign up for this 5K instead. It's actually being held in memory of the former and late athletic trainer from Longmeadow High School–Pete Krasnor–who taped me every single day for four years, and helped me through at least three major injuries (a broken finger, a broken ankle, and a horribly sprained ankle). He was special to me, but I know that there are hundreds of high school athletes around western Massachusetts who would say the same thing. So it's a personal goal but it's also a personal mission.