feeling much better

[kareina]

When last I posted (Thursday) I was still having issues with my back, after having done something wrong to it at fighter practice the weekend before, and trying to avoid catching the cold that lord_kjar had brought back from his week in Scotland. Since the back issues had started bothering my sleep I decided on Friday to find out what, if anything, the local medical professionals could to do help. So that morning I stopped into the local health clinic, which is in the set of buildings nearest my office. They made me an appointment to see a doc that afternoon. The doc listened to my description of how it happened, poked at it, had me lift legs and do various movements, and soon decided that I was correct, the problem is just muscles +/- alignment issues with my bones. Therefore there was nothing she could do about it, but she recommended that I see a physiotherapist. She explained that they don't have any on staff, but that there are a handful of them that work through the University Sports/Health center. She also gave me the name of an over the counter muscle relaxant that she said can help--she said that one can recover faster from such an injury if one isn't all tense and moving wrong from sore muscles.

So I stopped into the Uni Sport/Health center and asked about getting an appointment there. The next one available was for the following Wednesday morning. I booked it, though I sincerely hoped that I wouldn't still be having issues that many days into the future. I didn't get around to it on Friday, so on Saturday we also stopped in a drug store and purchased the muscle relaxant; even though I normally avoid drugs and medicines, her logic of why it would help the healing process was plausible.

That evening I had lord_kjar use the electric massage tool on my lower back and hip, and then I asked him to stretch my leg for me. I had been feeling all week like something was out of alignment in my hip--that if it had only been possible to insert a screwdriver between by tailbone and my hip and twist it a bit that it would all go back where it belonged and feel better. Sadly, doing an adjustment in that manner isn't really an option, and even if I tried the blood and ick from forcing a screwdriver through my flesh and between the bones is so not what I want to experience (to say nothing of how long that would take to recover). However, on that occasion, when he stretched/pulled my leg across my body I heard a small "click-click" and suddenly my hip and lower back felt much better. No idea if it worked that time because it had been out of place quite long enough, or if it was because of the electric massage tool or some combination thereof, but I am so not going to argue.

The doc had suggested that I try taking the muscle relaxants twice a day, but I haven't done that. I took it on Saturday at 13:00, even though I was feeling better from the hip adjusting on Friday, the muscles were still tight. I woke up at 6:45 on Sunday with a hint of soreness in my lower back, so took it again then and went back to sleep. This morning (Monday), I again woke up with a bit of stiffness in my lower back (at 02:58!), so I took a hot shower and the muscle relaxant, and went back to sleep. Once a day is better than the suggested twice a day, and with luck I won't need to take it again at all.

The weekend turned out to be a very lazy weekend. We had been scheduled to do another folk dance performance on Saturday, and I had been looking forward to it. However, his cold had him still very low energy and coughing often on Friday, and my back was still hurting then, so we sent our dance teacher a warning text message letting her know we might not be up for dancing. On Saturday my back was doing better (though still not perfect), but my nose had started running, and I decided that there was a good chance that anyone I danced with would wind up with the cold I was busy trying to fight off, so I shouldn't go. He was still coughing and feeling very low energy, so he decided he shouldn't go, and we sent a new message to let her know that, sadly, neither of us was available.

So instead of dancing we spent the weekend reading books (me), playing computer games (him), napping often (both) and watching way too many episodes of Stargate (while making some progress on sewing projects--my favourite blue cashmere sweater now has patches on the elbows (much needed, they had been wearing through), and my sexy cloak is now needs only a few more rows of decorative running stitch around the edge before I need to start on the applique decorations (which will help hold the lining to the cloak). I had never heard of Stargate before moving to Sweden (since I quit watching TV in the 1980s when I joined the SCA and realized that I would rather do things than sit around staring at a box watching people do things), but over the 20 months since moving here we have slowly worked our way through all of season one and part of season two, since it is a story he wanted to share with me. It is a pleasant excuse to sit and work on hand sewing, but I don't recommend as many hours as we watched this weekend. I don't think I have seen that much movie or TV at one go since I was in Jr. High. Luckily, being that much of a couch potato was good for fighting off the cold. I never have developed the cough that he got, and the hint of sniffles I had on Saturday turned out to be very mild and are mostly gone now. With luck that will be me, done with that cold.

I am slightly annoyed that I actually crossed the line into showing symptoms of colds twice this year, that is far more often than I like (and more often than "normal" for me, too). The last time was in March, when I brought back a cold from the trip to France. Since he wound up flying home from Scotland through France I am inclined to blame France for both colds (which could explain why this one has been so much milder in the symptoms I got).

Today I was back in my office at Uni for a full day for the first time in two weeks--I have been working from home (or not working on some days, when it was really distracting), and it was good to be back. It also turned out to be a very good day for it. One of the geologists from the mine stopped into the uni to pick up a copy of the PhD thesis of one of our students who is just finishing (and who is doing her project in conjunction with the mine). He also did his PhD here (in fact, I inherited his office when he finished up and started working for the mine), and he stopped in to say hello. He is working with some of the drill holes I have sampled for my project, and we had a very good conversation about the samples and which minerals are present and I followed up by sending him a pdf showing photos and graphs for one of the samples that is directly relevant to our conversation. While it can be very nice to work from home, there is value in being in the office--people can't drop in and chat if I am not there, and this conversation was very valuable both in terms of inspiration and for helping me decide which samples I want to examine next, and why. As a result I did manage to stay in my office for the full day, and didn't come home from work till lord_kjar was also done for the day.

This evening I celebrated feeling better by finally going through a stack of drawers with him and organizing it all. We now have several that are empty (and available for mom to keep small things in when she is here) and the others are labeled so that we can more easily find things. There is still another stack waiting to be dealt with, but it felt good to finally get to this stack. When I first moved in he knew what was in which drawer, but the stacks wound up in different order when they were moved from the living room to the office in the last major re-arranging of furniture, and ever since then he hasn't know which drawer is which, and I never did know what was in any of them.

Tomorrow I see the dentist, Wednesday the physiotherapist, Thursday is the shire armouring night, and Friday I fly south and join my mother as we go to visit cousins (I haven't met yet) in Denmark on her way here.

Comments

[kahnegabs.livejournal.com]

Glad the "adjustment" worked!