stress
I'm not sure, but I think I had some sort of stomach flu the past few days. Both Sunday and Monday, my stomach was jumpy all the time, and I got terrible nausea when I actually ate anything. I didn't throw up, though. I felt weak and tired the whole time, too. Tuesday I was feeling better and didn't get sick after eating lunch, but then got overly ambitious and had Taco Bell for dinner and ended up feeling absolutely terrible afterward. I'm feeling better again today (despite recklessly having Chef Boyardee ravioli for lunch) and hope that whatever it was is over.
It's in my nature to doubt myself, and I find myself questioning whether I even had any actual illness or whether it was just anxiety. My anxiety has been worse since my visit to the physical therapy doc (it's confusing: he's not the same sort of physical therapist I've seen before, and he didn't see me in some sort of rehab clinic like I'm used to-he's a doctor, and he saw me in a doctor's office, instead, but it's a PT place, with "Physical Therapy" in the name of the office, and he was giving me PT exercises-confusing).
Anyway, as I was saying, my anxiety has been worse. I think it's mostly due to anticipation, worrying about how I'm going to find time to do these PT exercises when I've gotten up to the number of reps the doc wants. The reps go with my breath, so I'm not going to get faster, which means that (extrapolating from how long 5 reps take me) the full 25 reps of all 5 exercises will take me nearly an hour and a half, and I'll have to find time to do this twice a day, at least 6 hours apart. Once I've hit 25 reps, the doc is going to have me doing the same exercises, but adding increasing amounts of ankle weights, so this whole thing is extending at least 2 months into the future. And I don't know what he'll want me to be doing long-term, since I assume I'll need to keep those muscles in shape even once we're done with the period of intensive PT. 3 hours of PT every day will be difficult to fit in some days, even in my fairly flexible schedule, especially since the sets need to be 6 hours apart. I can't just do them whenever is convenient for me or they might not be far enough apart.
Up until now, I've been doing the first set in the morning, before I go anywhere, and I'd been stressed about making time to do that when I'm doing 25 reps, because I would need to be getting up early in the morning. But I realized today that I could be a bit more flexible about it. On some days, days when I need to leave the house relatively early and it would be hard to fit in an hour and a half of PT, I could instead do my first set in the early afternoon (when I've gotten home from CWC, for example) and still be able to do the second set 6 hours later, in the evening. So I'm trying to be less stressed about how I'm going to manage. It's all weeks away, anyway, since I'm only just now moving up to 10 reps.
I'm not sure what the doc will have to say about stairs when I see him again. He assured me that the restriction on going up stairs was temporary, until we had strengthened the muscles around my knees, but I don't know if he's going to lift that restriction when I've gotten to 25 reps (after about 4 weeks of PT) or if he's going to want me to wait until I've worked my way up to using the ankle weights. I should have asked, but I was a bit overwhelmed by all the exercises he was giving me and all the things he was saying about how I was causing more damage to the cartilage with my everyday activities.
So I'm trying to be less stressed and just take this one week at a time, increasing the number of reps as directed and seeing how things go. If worse comes to worst, I could always change my schedule a bit (not go to my 11 a.m. stuff at CWC, for example), just for a few weeks if necessary.
It's in my nature to doubt myself, and I find myself questioning whether I even had any actual illness or whether it was just anxiety. My anxiety has been worse since my visit to the physical therapy doc (it's confusing: he's not the same sort of physical therapist I've seen before, and he didn't see me in some sort of rehab clinic like I'm used to-he's a doctor, and he saw me in a doctor's office, instead, but it's a PT place, with "Physical Therapy" in the name of the office, and he was giving me PT exercises-confusing).
Anyway, as I was saying, my anxiety has been worse. I think it's mostly due to anticipation, worrying about how I'm going to find time to do these PT exercises when I've gotten up to the number of reps the doc wants. The reps go with my breath, so I'm not going to get faster, which means that (extrapolating from how long 5 reps take me) the full 25 reps of all 5 exercises will take me nearly an hour and a half, and I'll have to find time to do this twice a day, at least 6 hours apart. Once I've hit 25 reps, the doc is going to have me doing the same exercises, but adding increasing amounts of ankle weights, so this whole thing is extending at least 2 months into the future. And I don't know what he'll want me to be doing long-term, since I assume I'll need to keep those muscles in shape even once we're done with the period of intensive PT. 3 hours of PT every day will be difficult to fit in some days, even in my fairly flexible schedule, especially since the sets need to be 6 hours apart. I can't just do them whenever is convenient for me or they might not be far enough apart.
Up until now, I've been doing the first set in the morning, before I go anywhere, and I'd been stressed about making time to do that when I'm doing 25 reps, because I would need to be getting up early in the morning. But I realized today that I could be a bit more flexible about it. On some days, days when I need to leave the house relatively early and it would be hard to fit in an hour and a half of PT, I could instead do my first set in the early afternoon (when I've gotten home from CWC, for example) and still be able to do the second set 6 hours later, in the evening. So I'm trying to be less stressed about how I'm going to manage. It's all weeks away, anyway, since I'm only just now moving up to 10 reps.
I'm not sure what the doc will have to say about stairs when I see him again. He assured me that the restriction on going up stairs was temporary, until we had strengthened the muscles around my knees, but I don't know if he's going to lift that restriction when I've gotten to 25 reps (after about 4 weeks of PT) or if he's going to want me to wait until I've worked my way up to using the ankle weights. I should have asked, but I was a bit overwhelmed by all the exercises he was giving me and all the things he was saying about how I was causing more damage to the cartilage with my everyday activities.
So I'm trying to be less stressed and just take this one week at a time, increasing the number of reps as directed and seeing how things go. If worse comes to worst, I could always change my schedule a bit (not go to my 11 a.m. stuff at CWC, for example), just for a few weeks if necessary.