Katsolo's Journal, 18 October 2020

So happy to hear it. Sounds like a really good outing.  

I'm happy, too. Not good at staying still.  

I am so happy for you to read this update. It has been a long haul getting your "normal" back. Your back is feeling better and it sounds like your workouts are going great! Good work! Deadlifts seem so counterintuitive that they would help with back problems... Seems like they would give them, but my back is ever so much stronger now that I am lifting. The little pains don't give me troubles anymore. Now if I can only figure out why my knee hurts. 🙄 Anyway, good going!!!!  

Nope, no deadlifts yet. I've just gotten to the point where I can straighten up without putting my hands on my thighs just the past couple of days. I can also get up off the couch without using my arms to pull/push. Yeah, it was like that. I seriously screwed myself up this last time and I do not want a repeat ever.  

Kat, I hate giving advice so I'll try to tell you a little bit about my journey with back issues. I broke almost all the transverse process bones in the left side of my back. Obviously very painful and I could barely get out of bed or a chair. It took almost 6 months of physical therapy to fix it. In addition to trying to strengthen and lengthen (with inversion table and other stetches) muscles in the back, we really focused on lots of stretching and strengthening adjoining muscles and ligaments, like the abs, hamstrings, glutes, IT band, and hip extensors. The exercises were all very simple to start with and I could barely do any of them. Gradually, more reps, more weight, more complexity. Anytime there was a sharp pain, we would stop. (Important to know a good pain from a bad pain). Usually ice and a TENS unit afterwards. I still have occasional back issues (bending over wrong to pick up a piece of paper!) but because of the all the things I learned in physical therapy, I can generally fix it myself in about 1 to 2 weeks. The most important piece of this journey was I got lucky and found a great physical therapist who spent lots of time manipulating body parts, taught me how to do simple exercises properly, and taught me how much all our body parts are connected. Since breaking my back and lots of other major bones at various times, I've done numerous 200 mile bike rides. I'm convinced I wouldn't have been able to do these events except for the great physical therapy. Glad to hear your back is getting better! 

SDCyclist, I am using my inversion table, I'm able to free hang again the last couple of days. hanging and stretching from side to side at this point, nothing radical. easing my way back into movement, and I realize it's going to take more time than before. Funny thing, that picking up the piece of paper exercise is one of the things that still gets me along with laying on my right side for any length of time. I get stuck and have to use my arms to pull myself upright. I'm stretching and I'm pulling out my garage sale total gym to do some resistance moves. Deadlifts scare me right now. Like you said, there's a good pain and there's the scary pain. That movement of coming up from bending over is scary for me right now. Sometimes it's okay, sometimes it's not and I can't call it until it happens. I'm just recently able to pull my stomach in tightly again, so making progress. Who thought I'd miss that? 

Not ignoring you, Chris. Just not ready mentally for deadlift. spellcheck wants to type Deadpool. for once, it's wrong, I'm always ready for Deadpool, he makes me laugh. 

Irony of ironies, my mailbox fell over in the middle of the night and i just finished resetting it after having to carry a fifty pound bag of cement from the workshop to my front yard. No idea that was going to happen, not my best job. But if USPS notices that something has changed, they can make you get an ugly standardized box on a metal stake, which I’m not interested in. 

My crazy back pain finally went away when I got my abs/core under control and gained a little extra strength in my upper bod/arms. Instead of trying to mostly strengthen your lower back, see first if your pelvis is tilted like mine was and work on getting it into a more neutral position while bracing your core as much as you can throughout the day. Engage your abs as if you’re going to take a punch to the gut and keep your spine as straight as you can whenever you’re sitting or standing. Don’t cross ya legs under the desk and take many breaks where you get up and stretch. I feel like you already have an ergonomic chair for work, so I won’t bore you with that, but I’ll just mention that your knees should be lower than your tush when you’re sitting at your desk. It also got so much better for me when I stopped having to sit so much after I stopped working.. sitting was killing my whole body, but now I miss sitting! Anyway, I’m glad you’re feeling better and hope you start to feel freaking awesome soon, Kat! ❤️