October progress report

Woops, I almost forgot to do an update this month! :O I guess that’s good news, right?

What’s Going On?

Recovery is going really really really really (etc etc) well.  I still have pain most days, but it’s a very subtle burning or sore feeling, not even terribly noticeable.  It’s at the point where distraction often makes it go away almost completely — if I’m involved in a good book or movie or conversation, I generally don’t notice the pain at all.

To that end, and I hope this doesn’t sound totally New Age-y, I’ve started doing a 30-day workbook on the Mind-Body Connection.  Here’s a link if anyone’s interested; the gist is that chronic pain can be caused/exacerbated by stress or by emotions that the brain doesn’t feel like dealing with.  This really rang a bell for me as my anxiety issues are the same way — my brain will often pull bullshit like, “hey, I don’t want to think about this deadline for work; instead I’ll ramp up your anxiety so that your chest hurts and you think you’re having a heart attack”.  So it makes perfect sense to me that the brain would also say, “hey, I don’t want to think about XYZ, so, here, have some back pain instead”.

Anyway, I’m on Day 5 of 30 of that workbook and I think it’s helping already, if for no other reason than that it makes it easier for me to deal (mentally) with the pain that I still do get.

Exercise.

  • Still doing three 20-second planks every night (“normal” forearm ones, then side planks on each side).
  • My weekly training with Melinda continues to go very well.  We’ve been working together for about six weeks now and I’ve never had a flare up or any kind of problem afterwards.  This past week, we started incorporating some light weights — a 5lb weight bar for doing straight leg deadlifts, and 5lb dumbbells for doing single leg deadlifts.  Everything else remains active stretching, bodyweight work, core work, etc.

Skating.

  • Still no public skating this month.  Like last month, this was due to scheduling difficulties more than my ability or lack thereof.  Right now my plan is to focus on the motorcycle until it starts raining; I’ll switch my focus to skating over the winter.

Motorcycling.

  • As evidenced in this journal, the motorcycling is going really well! Once I got over that 80 mile flare up, things are pretty much back to normal.   I don’t have any issues at all after yesterday’s 17-mile ride, and I’m planning on riding to Tuesday’s Sport-Touring.net dinner (about 6 miles each way).
  • I have hopes that maybe Peter and I can ride to Half Moon Bay for an overnight ride over Thanksgiving break — obviously we’ll play that by ear, but it would be fun.  I bet I could even talk him into eating at Cameron’s and getting massages.  Rough life!

So that’s what’s going on.  I see my back doctor for a checkup tomorrow, but I’m not expecting anything other than “glad things are improving; see you in another 4 months”.

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