The Mr's Turn

My time at physical therapy is coming to an end.

I'm actually sad about it because I love my therapist and I absolutely wouldn't have been able to have a Merry Christmas without her.  It's not that my chiro didn't work his darnedest to get me where I needed to be but sometimes you have to recognize when there is a component missing to your recovery.  Physical therapy was that for me and while I'm not 100%, I would say I'm about 90% and am almost in happy tears every time I throw in a workout that I have been physically unable to do for 6 months.

The Mr has had a nagging shoulder injury for quite some time.  About 10 years ago, he was complaining to our doc about how pain would come and go from it.  She ordered an x-ray (after telling him it was "part of getting older") and they had him hold a weight and it showed there was some slight separation of the shoulder.  She said it was likely from football when he was in high school but he doesn't remember being injured bad enough to warrant that kind of separation.  She told him it's nothing surgery could fix so basically, live with it.  Laser treatment from the chiro got him about 85% recovered after two falls...one when his paddleboard got stuck on a hidden stump underwater in 2015 and then 6 months later when he hit a rut while skiing.  That was a year ago.  He's still unable to comfortably sleep on his right side and some overhead strength sessions are painful for him. The chiro said this was fine though that he needed to push through some of the pain since his tissue was fully healed and he couldn't really damage it any more.

When he saw how dry needling and physical therapy helped me in such a short amount of time, he decided when the new year started, he'd bite the bullet.  Unfortunately my PT isn't accepting new patients so that would mean he'd go to one of the other two there.  The one girl I absolutely was not going to send him to because while she has her moments of showing signs of being human, most of the time she's very apathetic, indifferent, shows zero excitement or encouragement and you almost wonder if she even wants to be there or not.  Knowing the Mr the way I do, he would shut down with her.  The other choice is a guy that is in his late 20's and very and I mean very peppy and very down with using the term "bro" a lot.  The Mr can work with that but I couldn't.  Like if I met with him initially, I wouldn't have gone back because I would've ended up punching him in the throat.  He's like male cheerleader kind of material and that's fine but if you don't like that kind of interaction with people, you will loathe therapy.  It's very important to be comfortable with the person you're going to entrust with fixing what's broken with you.

So we went for the Mr's evaluation with his potential therapist.  He is very nice, again...peppy, but he does this thing that would've made me walk out if it were my appointment.  As he was quizzing him about things and he was telling him of his limited range of motion, he said something along the line of  "well, sorry you can still do things like laundry and anything where you're not lifting your arms so you can't use me to get out of household chores with her."  We smiled and laughed but the way he said it was very reminiscent to what I call the "little lady" that car dealers give you where they try to charm the women with 1950's humor that we're supposed to giggle at, blush and say "stop it" as we bat them away playfully.  It's not that I consider it sexist or anything because I'm not PC, it's just irritating and I think it's because maybe he doesn't deal with a lot of couples coming in together.  I don't know but still.  Then he was putting him through different tests and such and assumed because the Mr has a penis that he's a sports freak like him.  I totally forgot to warn him about this because the dude is seriously fanatical about his teams and saying you don't watch the NFL isn't acceptable.  (Why do people not accept that a man may not watch NFL football because he's just not that into it??)  Matter of fact, while I totally trust his abilities as a therapist, he seems to feel like his view on most things in life is how everyone should view life and won't stop until he makes you see the light.  This is another reason I wouldn't be able to work with him but the Mr deals with it in his job every day so he's used to it and it doesn't bother him too much.

His tests did show a major weakness in his right side obviously but much like me, it originates from a different place that the chiro really isn't able to evaluate because he's not a physical therapist.  My lower leg problems were stemming from my lack of strong hip and glutes.  His shoulder weakness is actually caused from poor posture caused partly by weak back muscles and then the over-worked chest muscles without balance from behind push his shoulders forward.  It doesn't help he slouches like crazy all day and given his grandpa had a severe hunchback when he was older, that is the direction we're heading if he doesn't correct this now.  He also got to experience dry needling!  Heh heh heh.  Of course he only had 5 needles, not 40 like I did so I don't see how that's fair.  ;-)  He used the "rope a dope" needles on him like I got my first session.  Basically the super thin acupuncture needles that you can't feel.  He was fine when they went in but coming out they weren't as pleasant but again he had five so yeah...deal, yo.  He was pulled off of all upper body exercises except the ones the therapist gave him for PT.  So it's the opposite of what I went through and we're going to have to do some finagling on strength days even if that means I need to do my upper body sessions at a different time than him.  We'll do whatever we need to.

Then he showed him some of the PT exercises he'll need to do to strengthen his back.  The Mr made it clear that he doesn't have the flexibility of schedule that I have so basically give him as much as possible so he can do them at home.  The PT made it clear he's going to have to give him a few weeks and if after that time there is zero improvement then he'd cut him loose but that he'll be a twice a weeker for the next few weeks.  This honestly is not the best time given the Mr has a big work test he needs to take in 3 weeks and you factor he's losing 90 minutes in driving to and fro and then 60 minutes of therapy, that's over 2 hours of studying he won't be getting in twice a week and I could tell it freaked him out.  Honestly, it freaked me out too because I kind of thought he was going to schedule it after his test.  But I encouraged him to make a calendar to write down all of the stuff he has on his plate and he's going to record some study stuff so he can listen to it in the car while he's driving.  This technique is one he used back in high school and for a few work tests over the decades so I'm sure it'll serve him well.

If the Mr just keeps his head down and focuses on his daily PT and works to strengthen those areas and tries to focus on keeping his posture nice and tall, I fully expect they will find their groove and he will gain that trust in him that I have in my girl.  But fair warning, if he starts saying "bro", I will flick him in the berries.

Do you have a nagging injury you're putting off treating?

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