My Journey With Health And Fitness – Time For A Break

Last night we joined some friends for dinner at one of our favourite restaurants. Wednesday they offer 2 for 1 drinks so often a group from our complex will get together for food and drinks. We left the condo at about 4:30pm to walk to the restaurant and condo kitty figured it must be dinner time but I felt it was too early. We got back at about 7:15pm and she was furious!! She chewed me out the entire time I was prepping her dinner and once she was finished eating she sat glaring at me. Fortunatelly this morning she seems to have forgiven me.

Monday night while I was trying to sleep I realized my right shoulder was a bit painful. I thought that odd because I hadn’t done anything to it and I had 3 days off from the fitness centre (while here I don’t do classes on weekends and Monday was a holiday so no classes). Tuesday I logged on for the strength and mobility class but dropped out after about 35 minutes because my shoulder was really starting to hurt. I tried again yesterday but there were technical issues so I couldn’t get on but I realized this was a good thing because my shoulder just got worse as the day progressed.

Yesterday I started applying my anti-inflammatory cream but it didn’t seem to be helping. I started to realize because of the nature of the pain it is likely a herniated disc as I have been through this before though not since I lost the weight and got fit. This was pretty much confirmed last night when I could barely sleep because laying down caused the pain to get even worse. This morning I still did a walk but canceled my fitness class.

I recognize that it is time for a bit of a break. Having been through this before I know I can make it even worse if I try to push things. As well, if it isn’t better by time I get home I’ll head to the doctor for some x-rays as well as likely a CT scan. I’ll probably end up back at the chiropractor and physio to try and get the disc to reabsorb.

The important thing is I recognize that taking a break to avoid making this worse is the best thing I can do. I know it is unlikely I did anything to cause this, it stems from my spinal stenosis. But, since I want to stay on my path I need to keep this in check until it is resolved. And so I will take the next week off to see how it goes and then reach out to my instructors for modifications for any and all shoulder work for the next little while. If that still aggravates things then it will be a longer break from the fitness centre than planned. All of that is ok because instead of making it up with extra walking (owing to the ongoing ankle issue) I will add an hour on the recumbent bike each day.

As Saturday we will be starting to prep to go home, I will not be posting on Saturday but will provide you with an update on Tuesday.