Monday, August 22, 2016

So I feel like I'm near the end of my pain/prp journey. I know I've felt this way for, like, years now, but I really do feel that I'm nearing the end.  ...In the beginning, after a treatment it felt like I had a new body, it was behaving so differently that I had to spend a lot of time figuring out how to use it.  Now, it's starting to feel like I'm just no longer in pain in that particular area. 

For example, after Dr. Fullerton addressed my glute med, I now squat with a symmetrical stance. It used to be my feet were always staggered a little, now my feet are both underneath me. But that's it. It doesn't feel like things are working completely differently, when I resumed squatting it didn't feel like all kinds of muscles were being used differently. I didn't get random DOMS in odd muscles. Now things just work better and I'm in less pain. 

Pretty much the same story with my shoulder. I can now keep my scapula retracted while pressing, and I'm in less pain, but it's not like my tricep or pec minor is suddenly working differently.

If Dr. Fullerton were to retire and I couldn't see him again, I would be disappointed but I wouldn't feel doomed. The pain that I have in my shoulder is very manageable, though the pain in my hip does flare up from time to time.

For my hip, the location seems to point to the psoas. When I read the symptoms of an injured psoas, my symptoms check off pretty much the entire list. I have some nebulous groin pain, I have pain in my lower back, it takes some effort to stand upright, and the knee on the opposite side doesn't feel like it's working right.

For my shoulder, things are less clear. My upper trap and posterior scalene are tight a lot of the times, as well as my infraspinatus. But if I were a betting man I would say they are responding to issues lower down my back.  Like the intercostals or my lat or both.  Whenever the chiro works those muscles I feel like it's addressing the cause of everything. We will see when I see Dr. Fullerton again.

Now that I have normal testosterone levels, I'm really seeing gains in the gym. I've lost about 20 pounds over the past two months, and all my track times are going down (as you would expect with being lighter) and my strength seems to still be going up. So things are really awesome right now. I don't want to mess with this by taking a month off again, but this nagging hip/psoas pain is starting to get to the point where I think it will be worth it.  I think once pool/track season is at an end I'll get my (hopefully) last treatment from Dr. Fullerton. Feel like a broken record saying that.

So that's where I stand: I'm in a good place, but I feel like I'm *this* close to being 100%, and that excites and scares me a bit.