Physiotherapy is a tricky thing, I'm learning. Apparently the reason that most people never fully recover from a back injury, and are left with pangs from routine activities, is because when something happens to the spine all the semi-voluntary muscles in the vicinity of the disc shut themselves off in order to avoid causing any further damage.
Consequently, there are a handful of lower back, stomach, and bum muscles that are apparently not working in me right now -- only I'm mostly unaware of them. This would also explain why every time I start feeling better, the moment I do anything I should reasonably be able to do, I hurt myself again.
So the physiotherapist keeps teaching me new excercises to repeat each morning, and they're getting trickier. The bum ones are pretty straightforward, and having such a large and muscled bum I can pretty much tell most of what I'm doing. I'm still focussing mentally on them so that next time I try to carry a PS2 plus gear home across a large parking lot, I'll walk more carefully and not injure myself again. (!!! and I was doing SO WELL)
The "transverse abdominal" exercises are a little trickier, seeing as they're entirely supporting muscles and it's impossible to feel any sort of "burn" while doing the exercise; the idea is simply to engage them whilst working surrounding muscles, in order to teach them to work properly again and to teach my other muscles how to work in a controlled and coordinated manner.
Basically, I spend an hour each morning practicing how not to be a spazz. The fact that twenty seven years into my spasmodic life I may actually learn to tone down my goof-factor is a thoroughly entertaining side-effect.
The other movements are just strengthening ones, and they're surprisingly yoga-posture like. The "boat" is one I've never been able to do right before; like my bridges, my spine is so flexible that I end up hinging at the joints instead of bending with my muscles. Mieko gave me a hard time about this all the time, but I never understood what she was trying to explain until I got the same lecture in different words from the physiotherapist.
I get it now. And even though I can reach back and pull my ankles past my ears, during my five minute sustained "boat" this morning I barely lifted my thighs off the floor -- but I felt all the muscles come together and for a second all my back pain faded entirely.
I'm a little sore now but I'm hoping it's abuse soreness. If I stay sore tomorrow I'll definitely telephone, but in the meantime the eliptical machine awaits, and then perhaps a little sewing practice before my afternoon outing. I gained quite a bit of weight post-partum due to six weeks of enforced motionlessness, and coupled with a few shrunken sweaters I've been wearing pretty much nothing but jeans and t-shirts lately. While this is my favourite form of dress, I do occasionally enjoy only wearing the one layer. Consequently, it's fleece turtle-cow-neck with satin piping down the front. I figured I'd try adding a seam down the front as though I'd meant to put a zipper in, I think that might give the sweater a little more shape since fleece (even this thick one) is so fickle.
Does it sound like I know what I'm talking about? Don't let me fool you -- I'm still working on it, but I have some of the best inspiration and teachers humanly available, from Nicole to Stacy to miss Kitty herself who bought the very fleece and piping with me.
Mmm. Enough thankfulness for today; the eliptical machine is learning to clamour with alarming volume.