My shoulder

For anyone following this blog my shoulder started hurting in June, just before VBS, probably due to some major web surfing for home school information and ideas. I adjusted (moved the mouse over to the left, which mainly resulted in my using the pointer on my laptop with my right hand) and tried to do more with my left arm. I also had some wrist pain, then that went away. Shoulder hurt a lot one week and then didn’t hurt as much. But it kept hurting and every once in awhile I would whine about it (Anthony may dispute my use of the phrase “every once in awhile”). Anthony finally told me to do something about it or hush.

Last Wednesday I went to the doctor and he confirmed that I have strained my rotator cuff (the 4 muscles that make up the rotator cuff). But nothing is torn. Then I sent in pictures to Egoscue and we played phone tag. I finally called them today and signed up for 5 menus of exercises over the next 8 to 10 weeks. Anthony and I compared the pictures from mid-July when I first thought about contacting Egoscue and the pictures from mid-August after I had been doing some of the E-cises from the books and we can already see a difference. I also can feel a difference, but my shoulder still hurts. They do say it can take 12 to 18 months to recover from a strained rotator cuff, and you recover by torture doing exercises to strengthen it. I keep telling myself I don’t really know who “they” are, and I’m a wimp so I whine.

The doctor gave me anti-inflammatory medicine and offered PT or a cortisone shot. I will work with Egoscue first and see how that does. I have had a few people warn me away from the cortisone, but the doctor spent 5 minutes talking about how they aren’t bad and 95% of the people who get them have no problems and the shoulder is the easiest place to give one. I still think this is an opportunity to make a long-term change to my posture/structure and I’m not convinced that a shot can fix something that could take months to get better on its own.

The good news is that the pain is still there, but much better over the past week. I start my new Egoscue menu of exercises tomorrow morning and I’m still keeping up with my yoga in the evenings. Work and homework and homeschooling all fit in there somewhere!