A Bad Night

Things are not good.

I have had some significant adjustments, changes around the neck-shoulder-jaw, which have corresponded to the opposite hip.  Weird shit.  Some shifts have been big, a lot of meat changing where it sits.

As a result, something is amiss near my right ear.  The right side of my face is swollen, as well as a gland just under the ear.  Pain, pain, and pain.  I can't go horizontal without sharp sustained throbbing.  So, I can't sleep.

Hence, the iPad and this entry.

I've taken a lot of pain meds, and ibuprofen for swelling, to seemingly no avail.  Icing my head does little.

I do not think it is an ear infection, though it hurts like one, at least not a classic one.  I think it was an aggravation by trauma to joints tangled near the jaw and ear from my original injury.

I am sure dying ain't exactly fun no matter how it comes, but I don't want to go like this.

Anyways, here I sit, tormented, face numb from Narco but the ear/head still throbbing, unable to rest, unable to sleep.

I am honing in on some old feelings, but I cannot describe them well, like segmented cords shifting within me.

Enough, I suppose.

First swim, enter curse words of choice

i tried to bike to the pool.

I got there and back, with multiple thigh subluxations along the way.

The "swim" was no better.  One limb was constantly pulling out of the socket.  500 meters of various paddling and kicking, wanting to scream the entire time.

Oh, and I start the season at 244 pounds.  Ouch.

I have serious doubts any further "rehab" is going to be possible.  I will give it my all, everything I can muster, to learn if I can.  I know this means agony, but the alternative is letting myself go completely and not lasting much longer.

This is going to suck.

Well, not dead yet . . .

I'm not dead yet.

This winter has been torture, however.  I feel worse, look worse, and basically have gotten worse.  Walking has become not just painful, but difficult.  Just being has become, tough.

Of course, changes continue.

Part of me wants to believe this feeling I am experiencing is analogous to squeezing something through a small opening, that it hurts so much because it is close to done, but that I am near finishing the task.  Unfortunately, I now doubt this very much.

I have known the "almost there" belief for too many years, and this boy is done crying wolf.

Even if there is an "opening" to metaphorically squeeze through, it is likely too far or two small for me to achieve.  I'm not going to win.  If anything, one of these days I will slide something into a position that chokes me, my collar bone and throat being the mess they are.

That said, I couldn't stop "adjusting" if I wanted to.  The process continues.

I am miserable.

Still Kicking . . .

It has been a while since I posted anything.  I got pretty low.

Only mostly dead, however, which is still partly alive.  I am still kicking, and wiggling, and twisting, and contorting.

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In the last several months, I finally got a new puppy, Nymeria.  It was very tough on me potty training her.  Right when progress was made, she was spayed, and spent two weeks with the Cone of Shame on (also had dew claws removed), which has been a horror.

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I am worn out beyond measure, yet the progress continues.  I am closer to finding my center than ever.

Of course, I am also in grade A, first class, pain.

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One bother has been the realization that I can't possibly go to the movies and see Star Wars.

I am not the hugest of Star Wars geeks, but I did grow up with the films, I did have all the toys, and I am a movie nut.  Granted, I have not been to a theater since taking my kid to Toy Story 3, but still.  This is Star Wars.  I am an Abrams fan, loving what he did with Star Trek, and I WANT to see this new movie very much.

It's just, too much pain.  No way I can handle the (drive + lines + hours in a movie seat) without being in fantastical pain for weeks afterwards.

I must wait for on-demand, sadly.

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Among the positives is I may be working out how to explain the "center" to people in a way that may actually click with some.  It is still rough, but hopefully it will be my next post, complete with some math (well, using vectors in an example, anyways).

Summer Post Mortem

Fuck.

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I weighed myself today to discover I had gained 5 pounds over this Summer.  That's more than a first.  Previous Summers had been getting worse because I had been losing less weight, last year only 12 pounds.  That is a 17 pound swing compared to my worst summer in a decade (probably ever).

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The combination of no Adderall, more pain, and worsening of the joints has completely kicked my ass.

I am limping to the finish line.

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While there was some progress, it can't make up for the steps backwards.  It just can't.

I am failing.

My despair is such that I even managed to take a wrong turn while trying to bike home from the pool today.

The body is gone.  The brain is shot, and I don't even got liquor's satisfaction anymore.  :(

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I find myself adding things up, more and more.  I want to die.  I am tired of this.

Will I?  probably not, by my own hand, at least.  Stubborn, stupid, and afraid, I'll limp (or be wheeled, more likely) to the finish line.

A New Breakthrough

Just as things were at an all time low, I had a breakthrough.

I can't say if it was out of desperation, or simply on faith in what I am doing, but I "rode" some sensations, inward, into my core, into my torso.  It did some changes, ones I always feared I may need to do, ones I fear I am not done with yet.

These changes in my torso, some serious shifting, had dramatic effects on shoulders, hips, and neck.  In fact, I became focused on the neck, a type I can not yet articulate, but which centered on breathing through the nose with the back of the nasal passages elongated (if that makes sense).

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I did this both before and during my swim yesterday.  Things just got plain weird.

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Then, today, back at the pool, my pectorals were sore during this newly found breast stroke.

I cannot stress this enough,  I don't know that they have ever before been sore.  I don't know that I ever before used them, at least not properly, hopefully in a position near where they are supposed to be.

This means that my previous breast stroke, one which used so much leverage from improper muscles (and one which the local swim adult swim coach still wanted me for his relay team because it was fast!), was ALL WRONG!

There is no way for me to know how RIGHT things are now, but it was a moment of progress when one was sorely needed.

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I am so very tired.  I am far too exhausted to write out all the changes to various limbs, however useful it may become in time, to understand better what I have done / am doing.

I'm just spent.

I even refused a hug from my kid a few minutes ago.  I'm in that much pain, everywhere.

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One thing worth noting, regarding the hip changes, the left leg is moving a lot in relation to the hip.  So much so, it becomes quite difficult to walk.  I become unable to put any weight on it at all.  Then, when it settles into place (along with other torso changes), it suddenly can walk, though quite stiffly and sore.

I may be reaching a stage I long hoped would NOT happen, because of how difficult it would be.

Hopefully, I overestimated how hard it would be while I underestimated how hard it was to get here.  I genuinely believe this to be possible.  Things may snowball as muscles build while in their proper position (or close to it) as compared to the strengthening which happened out of position (as if working out with dislocated limbs, wait, oh yeah, that's exactly what I have been doing!).

It better start getting easier, or at least gain some momentum.  Otherwise, I'm fucked.

Another New Kick

It has been a great struggle of late.

I have not been able to come close to the amount of swimming I was doing by this time last year.  I am barely doing a third as much.

That said, progress is still being made.  My kick has improved yet again. 

I want to go into full details, but am too drained to focus well enough to do it.

The rough outline:  I am generating the kick from much higher up my legs.  When I find a certain groove, it is almost as if I am no longer kicking, no longer using force against the water.  It is much more like both my legs oscillate opposite each other and are snaking their way through the water.

I literally speed up using much less force.

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In just a few days of this, I have had to deal with significant lower abdomen posture changes, which in turn change everything above it.

My chest is a mess.  It is possible the shoulder issues are of such a range as to cascade far around the chest.

As always, the right and left sides are inversions of each other, making adjustments tricky.  When I manage to move correctly, things slide into place almost seamlessly.  When not, it's unpleasant, with resulting discomfort and issues galore.

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Most disconcerting is the difficulty in swallowing I have had these past weeks.  Near every swallow is a chore, often not successful. 

I have even failed to swallow a swig of water on more than one occasion.

When the chest/shoulder contortions are severe, the neck sometimes buckles, sometimes unbuckles (when I did not know it was buckled in the first place!), making swallowing impossible for a term, or alternatively, making me capable of swallowing anything with ease.

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I am unstable on every front, physical and mental.