Day 75 - Huh

A little physical therapy update.

Last week my doctor recommended I see a PT. He said there was one in his office that was great. I thought about making an appointment with him, but it's a bit too far up-town and I figured if I have to go like 2-3x a week, I'd prefer one closer to my office. So I disregard his recommendation and begin my search.

I went to my insurance company's provider search and found a couple close ones. I took a look at each of there websites. And decided to call the one with the best site. (Being an interactive creative director I have issues trusting organizations with crappy sites) The receptionist who answered my call didn't have the professional sound I expected. She was an extremely loud talker, kind of crass and a little too um, something. I tend to pass judgements too quickly sometimes so I decided to ignore my gut and schedule an appointment.

So today at noon I began my 6 block trek down to their office in a crazy typhoon like rain storm with 20 mile/hr winds. Every now and then I had to dodge a flying broken umbrella. 5th ave was littered with them. Anyway, I finally get to the office.

The lobby is a bit shady and shoddy looking and as it turns out — they are located on a 6th floor walk up!

HUH?? What the hell? Who the hell thought it was a good idea to open up a PT office at the top of a walk up?

Once again, I should have trusted my gut, but I choose to give them a shot.

I finally make my way to the top and that's when I just had enough. The office was shabby and dirty looking. Exercise equipment was placed in the waiting room along with ripped seats that were taped up. There was no one in the waiting room except for some weirdo wearing pink scrubs. Who, by the way, I would never let touch me. Not even for a billion dollars.

The receptionist asked if she could help me and all I could say was...

Did you guys really think it was a good idea to rent space at the top of a 6th floor walk up? I mean seriously. How do your patients even make it up here?

I was definitely a bit snotty and um bitchy.

She smiled and said, oh I'm sorry I never asked what was wrong with you on the phone. I told her don't worry about it because I will not be staying for my appointment. Thanks anyway. And I ran the hell outta there.

Lessons learned:

follow recommendations

trust your gut

don't trust a book by it's website

Day 49

Men, I'm warning you right now this post is all about women stuff.

So the last couple of days have been really hard. One thing I have never mentioned is that about 3 years ago I was diagnosed with PMDD. One of my initial hopes was that with a healthy PCP lifestyle my symptoms would decrease. Well in fact this month it's here with a vengance. Some months are better than others, but when it's bad it's really bad. I have every single highlighted item on the list below and the ones in red are the ones that really interfere with my daily life.

These usually last about a week to two weeks a month and subside after, you know after my friend comes. But, that little bastard doesn't seem to want to come this month. This has happened the last time I trained hard and lost some weight. I didn't get it for like 6-8months.

It really sucks because I am so cranky, I just hate everything and everyone right now, I am completely EXHAUSTED all the time, my back is KILLING ME, I want to eat everything in the house. And by the way that's just what I did the other night. Unfortunately, or maybe fortunately, all I have in the house are healthy things so I ended up downing the following; 6 pitted dates, an extra apple, an extra egg white, 5 dried pineapple rings, cup of Kashi 7 whole grain cereal puffs with skim, 30 grams of a whole wheat baguette, I think there might have been some cold yams and I'm sure there is some other things I can't think of now...anyway this was after my evening snack so I already had consumed all my food for the day. Even after that I was still hungry but I made myself go to bed. I really want to eat something else tonight but right now I am just too tired to move.

I trained Capoeira tonight and my lack of coordination, focus, extreme fatigue and backache made it really freaking difficult. I had to fight hard not to just pick up and walk out of class. Then I came home and had to do my timed jumps. That sucked even more. My shins are so sore and I couldn't keep a rhythm to save my life. Ugh...I think I'm done for the night. Going to bed. Can't wait till this time next week when I can feel like myself again.

Day 7

WTF!?! How did a full week go by already? At first I thought this past week would take forever but now looking back I have no idea where it went.

I was very grumpy at work today. I don't know if it was because I haven't felt full once in the past week or what. But, I want to apologize to Jenn, aka Looney Bun, for any snappiness I might have thrown her way.

I can't even tell you how happy I am to be off the half diet. My normal diet is pretty good so when I actually had to cut it in half I was starving.

Patrick gave us our new food plans for week 2. I was so excited and curious to see how different it would be from what I normally eat so I prepared tomorrow's dinner as my final "half " meal. I was glad to see that I wasn't too far off in my regular diet. I did notice that I usually put A LOT more carbs on my plate than I do veggies. I was also extremely happy to find out that the portions are quite larger than I expected them to be.

I'd like to announce that my back is feeling a bit better today. Both my mestre Foca and Patrick gave me some exercises and stretches to do that should help elevate the soreness. Thanks guys!!

I want to wish my fellow PCPers good luck in week 2. Only 83 more days to go!!

Day 6

Holy freaking back ache batman!! My lower back is absolutely killing me.

Today I woke up early and completed my PCP workout. Then after work I trained Capoeira for 1 1/2 hours. For the past couple months my lower back has been bothering me every time I train. I believe it's not necessarily my back, but the muscle or tendons that run from my back to my hamstrings. Usually it's only the right side that hurts, but now it's BOTH sides. I do several stretches in the morning, after class and before bed. I ice it during the day at work and before I go to bed. I'm plain out of ideas. When I took the month of December off, it was definitely better but as soon as I started training again it came back. I certainly am not going to be taking it easy any time soon. So, I looked up some new stretches online and Foca, my mestre, suggested some. I'm hoping they will help. Patrick do you have any suggestions?

Other than that, I'm hanging in there and looking forward to starting our next nutritional phase. I'm curious to see what we will be eating.