Magical tennis balls and other things I never thought I'd say.

So apparently the waning of my 36th year coincides with the total disintegration of my body, including its descent into a bizarre constellation of chronic pain.

And no, I don't think you can descend into a constellation. I don't really know where that came from. Pretend it's poetry. It could happen.

Seriously, okay, so I haven't been exercising regularly for...oh, most of 2007. I don't even remember when it stopped being a thing I really felt I should do on a regular basis, or whether or not that exactly coincided with the spike in my consumption of anything related to dark chocolate. No idea. Somewhere in there I decided to go back to graduate school, and since that began 48 days ago, the concept of any exercise other than slogging from the parking lot to my classes and back up the highway to work has disappeared.

And although I've gone through many, many stops and starts in exercise routines in my life, I thought I was doing okay, because I'm so intensely in motion most of the time. I thought it would balance out.

Apparently not. And also, everything hurts. Everything. I'm not even kidding. Of course it doesn't help that I'm one of the most accident-prone people I know, and constantly rushing from one thing to the other with papers and books flying, so I also drop everything, at least once, and occasionally on myself, in a place where it's liable to hurt or wound me.

A few years ago, there was the cutting phase, where I kept slicing my fingers when I meant to do things like open cans or close car doors. That was fun, and only resulted in two trips to the emergency room, FOR THE SAME FINGER, FIVE YEARS APART. (The second incident may or may not have involved a wine cork and a knife. Stupid really IS as it does sometimes, especially when I'm doin' it.)

This year has been the slamming and bumping year, and not, unfortunately, in some contexts where it might relieve stress. On St. Patrick's Day, there was the great laptop-dropping incident, when my MacBook fell out of its case and landed on my toe, leaving it purple and misshapen, THROUGH MY BIG BLACK BOOT. Lesson: do not fuck with the MacBook PRO, and also do not ever expect your previously well-formed toe to return to its natural color, shape or size. Then in the summer I burned my arm, I know not how, and the scab came off before it had really healed, leaving a weird big Harry Potter slash where previously there had been none.

The next time my body revolted was in August, when I slept in a chair all night at the ER with my grandmother, until they got her a bed. You know how you sleep on your neck wrong sometimes, and you're all screwed up? Try sleeping on your whole BODY wrong. My back was messed up for days, the first indicator that things were not going well with my physical person.

Then last week, at the yoga studio where I clean and do other extraneous tasks, I dropped a tent on my foot. Don't ask. Just, don't. But know that those tents that you use for festivals? That fold up and go into a case that makes them look all handy and compact? They are STILL HEAVY, as my foot reminds me whenever it just sort of caves in like it currently does.

And as the icing on the cake of "Happy new year where your body falls apart", my knee often hurts when I'm just sitting still, my pinkie finger on my left hand has rays of pain constantly through it like I sprained it and didn't realize it, and my runner friend indicates that plantar fascitis is the reason that when I get out of bed in the morning I can barely walk due to severe pain in the soles of both of my feet. Had I changed my walking routine? Yes. Was I wearing shoes appropriate for walking at all times? Absolutely not.

Apparently this is a bad idea. And the proposed solution - resting the foot - is not an option. There are some cool things you can do that involve hanging off of steps and stretching your feet out, so that seemed the way to go.

I feel embarrassed even talking about all of this, because I get really tired of talking about any kind of health woe and must admit I get a little impatient when always people focus on theirs in conversation to the exclusion of other topics, because I think it can become a bad habit. But this is an extreme situation for me, enough for me to make some immediate changes, because it's all compounded very suddenly and I don't want it to get worse.I think as a species we're fairly unaware of the whole "Your knee bone's connected to the hip bone" business that means one part of your body not working well has an impact on the other parts. It really does. My friend said that my heel and sole being messed up could well impact my knee, because you walk funny to accommodate pain and that puts the rest of you out of whack.

Anyway, I cannot continue down this particular rocky road. I need to get back into some kind of healthy activity, and deal with this sudden onset of chronic pain, which is a little hard when you can't WALK correctly, and also when you walk a lot, which I do. So tonight I actually went to the yoga class I'm signed up for, and immediately learned a trick that helped me so much that I want to share it. It's a little weird, but I suggest it.

Sit on a tennis ball. Really. Do it. Especially If you have any kind of lower back issues or tend to clench your muscles from your quads through your butt and on up your back, which apparently I do because relaxing myself is such a problem. I think I even sleep with my little fists balled up, like I'm ready to box with God with my too-short arms.

So this is what you do: Get a tennis ball, put it on the floor, and sit down, one cheek on the ball. Then, move from side to side and from left to right on the tennis ball, pushing down hard enough that you feel the ball loosening up your muscles.

Take the ball out from under you, and relax into the floor. Feel the difference in your butt cheeks! (My Google searches! Woohoo!) I mean, really feel them. Like with your hands. If you're in a yoga class, no one will think you're weird, because hey, have you seen the stuff it's okay to do in there? And if you're alone, well, who cares anyway?  I'm a total skeptic about such things but it really did feel so different. You'll see. Then move the ball to the other cheek, and do the same thing. Honestly, my jaw even relaxed after I did this. Everything's connected.

I also stepped on the tennis ball and rolled my foot all around on it, to relax the soles and try to fix this other problem that's making me feel like I need to steal one of those motorized scooters from the Target just to get around campus. That worked too! Not as immediately, or as well as sitting on the tennis ball ( I really cannot believe I'm talking about this, honestly!), but it made a difference.

I wasn't really expecting to contend with this sort of thing yet, but if all hell's going to break lose in my muscles and joints at this inopportune time, I'll take whatever curative measures I can get...because I'd really like to move on to other things. 

Comments

[Grace]

I've been having the plantar fascitis struggle for the last year or so, and it is a monster pain. You do literally get to the point of not being able to walk. The stretches you mention and the tennis ball are the best start, as well as paying really close attention to your shoes. If it doesn't let up, though, I can't give a strong enough recommendation to steroid injections in your feet. Yes, shots in the bottom of the foot hurt, but the relief is so amazing.

[Lisa]

Thank you for this post! I turned 40 this year - and am not a big exercise buff. Couple that with newly diagnosed thyroid disease, adrenal fatigue, and depression and I'm weak and sore most of the time :-(

(My most recent mishap is a strained quadricep muscle from doing yoga!!!)

I'll definitely try this tennis ball work out!

Here's to home remedies that work,
Lisa