Counting Down

I haven't updated in awhile, mostly because I've been rather busy. I've also been relatively pain-free for most of the time.

The worst came last Wednesday, when we learned a move in t'ai chi called "Finding a snake in the grass." It is a variation of the crouch step, only...lower. Pretty much as low as you can get. You stick one leg straight out, bend the other one down, and then slowly shift your weight to your other leg, then stand up. Whether or not you get the idea from this description, the point is, my thigh muscles were screaming at me. It was a good workout, but...wow. They hurt for two days.

My main problem has been whatever decided to settle in my lungs. I've been coughing, with vigor, for a good two weeks now. I have an appointment today to address that, along with another issue, which may or may not be mentioned here.

I'm down to one or two sra sessions left. I'm also down to the last two weeks of college. Lots of change ahead for me.

Today was a very exhausting day, as well. When I walked in, the first thing I saw were sparring gloves and mitts. We spent the first 15 minutes punching each other's hands. It was pretty fun, I'll admit. Still exhausting. After that, we proceeded to work on certain steps in the form. One of them being the aformentioned thigh-killer. We did this...too many times. I didn't kill my legs as bad this time, though, since I didn't go all the way down. Don't get me wrong, though, my legs still hurt.

At least the worst thing that I have to do today is walk around. I've worked out enough today already.

The Third Day

Third day of my SRA thing today.

I went in feeling pretty stiff and sore. T'ai chi, and the walk to and from, really wore me out. That, combined with changing weather and stress, are a triple threat that takes a lot of willpower to deal with.

I had given the therapist the link to this site, and she checked it in the meantime. Not only did my x-ray help her out immensely, she was both impressed and excited that I've been documenting my story. Hearing that makes me very happy. If this treatment works, she believes that my story will help other people dealing with the same issues as I am. I am more than happy to contribute to furthering knowledge on this new type of treatment and the uses it has.

The pain didn't really come back until about half an hour after I left. Even then, it was fatigue pain for the most part, until about an hour ago. That, though, has a separate cause, since my back hurts when I get stressed, and I was under a great deal of that tonight. Hopefully, a good night's sleep will help that, as will turning in the project that caused the night's stress levels to peak.

Hopefully, I won't hurt much tomorrow. Publication design critique will be pretty much painful even without back pain.

I'm happy to report that there was none of the surface skin pain that I had the first time that I had the SRA treatment. I didn't really hurt much at all yesterday, but I did spend a good deal of my time sitting down. Today will be more of a test.

I decided to park in a lot south of campus and walk to all of my classes today, as opposed to driving to my first class and then parking. This is signifigant, because not only do I have to carry my work-out clothes with me all day, it is a long way to walk. Since I'm such a visual person, I took a map of campus and drew out everywhere I have to walk today:


Sorry about the crappyness, I didn't put much effort into it)

T'ai chi was a lot easier today, mainly because we didn't do those kicks that we did on Monday. We went over the forms we've learned so far, added one more, then he taught us meditation techniques. That was pretty cool, actually. I knew how to do what he was teaching, but I still enjoyed it.

Currently, I'm exhausted, but I'm not in a significant amount of pain. The pain that I have is the "after exercise" type, not the muscle cramp type. This is good.

I have a class, my internship, and then I work at Piazza at 5. The test of how the treatment is working will come then. Let's hope that I can continue the streak of not taking painkillers.

Spinal Reflex Analysis (SRA)

Spinal reflex analysis, or SRA, is the technique that the therapist is performing. This is the description from spinalreflexanalysis.com:

"Where all other therapies currently focus on simple reflex reactions, Spinal Reflex Analysis (SRA) focuses on the ASR, the root cause of these reactions. SRA is a fast and extremely accurate system of identifying the involved axial spinal reflex and 'turning them off' through specific SRA based treatment programs."

Basically, she's working directly with the nerves to "turn them off". What this means is, my muscles won't hurt nearly as much. I also think that it will prevent them from getting to the pain stage so easily.

I have only had one treatment, which was last Friday. I didn't say too much about it then, mainly because I wanted to have the information in once place. I did find the one site dedicated to SRA, but i didn't find a whole lot of information besides that. This is a new treatment, so I'm really not that surprised. I will post the link in the sidebar and try to describe it as best I can.

She places her finger on a specific nerve, in a specific pattern. To begin with, the pain level is about a 4 or so...just under flinching away stage. She keeps her finger on that place, and asks me to move my eyes in a certain pattern. The way she explained it to me, moving the eyes stimulates the nerves in your brain, and the pain gradually fades to nothing. She continues this through a certain pattern for about an hour. I looked for a graphic of this on the internet, but I didn't find one in the couple minutes that I looked. I will try to get the copy of the one she gave me on here eventually.

When I went in last week, I was really sore and really tense. When I left, I was pretty relaxed. That night, and the next day, my muscles felt okay, but my skin was really tender. I think it might have something to do with the release of lactic acid and other chemicals from my achy muscles. My eyes also hurt a little, I'm assuming since I moved them around so much. We will see if this happens again, and if that reaction is normal.

I have not taken my painkillers for a couple weeks now. Not that I haven't been in enough pain to take them: I have. But I think that my t'ai chi, combined with the SRA is helping me to remain relaxed enough to keep the pain at a bearable level. I hope this will improve over time.

My second SRA appointment is today. I'll post sometime after that.

I forgot to post about this earlier.

Wednesday, I made the decision that I would try my hardest not to take hydrocodone. This was going to be a tall order, since I was scheduled to work twice at one job and once at another, plus 2 classes. But hey, if i can make it through a day like that, then I can make it through pretty much any day.

I only worked an hour in the morning, so while I was sore, I didn't stand up long enough to really let it get bad. It was the walk to T'ai Chi that felt really...interesting. Mind you, it was raining pretty hard, so not only was I sore, but cold and wet as well. Once I got there and changed, though, it was a lot better.

My poor leg muscles got their first real workout in a very long time. However, the results were not what you might think. Yes, I was very tired, but afterwards, I felt more relaxed than I have in a long time. And I had no pain for a few hours. It was amazing.

I didn't begin hurting again until my second shift at Piazza. I knew this one would hurt. I didn't start hurting until about an hour in, and it hit me pretty hard. I remedied this situation by reflecting back to how I was standing during t'ai chi, and it really helped. And I managed to meet my goal; I did not take painkillers that day.

In fact, I haven't taken any since Monday.

I will most likely need them Sunday, but I want to see how I do. Wish me luck, this is a very difficult thing to do.