Tag Archives: Pain

Compassions Anew

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I kinda wish I could give you a humorous account of my crazy weekend, but I can’t. Apart from going to church Friday evening and Sunday morning (followed by lunch out with a good friend), I did nothing.

I do occasionally have lazy days, but this weekend I took it to new heights. Sleeping more than 8 hours in a stretch is hard on my back, so when I started getting over the pneumonia last week (in the early days I woke every couple of hours for medicine), I tweaked my back, since I was sleeping so much. The only way to get it back to normal is to do nothing but lay down, periodically getting up to stretch and wiggle.

So that’s what I did Friday and Saturday. By Sunday, my back was normal again, but I did continue to rest, only taking time to make breakfasts and lunches for the week.

And now that it’s Monday, I think I’m ready to take on the world again.

I’m ready for a normal week, one without taxes, tornadoes, and disease.

This 28-Year-Old Body

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Well, my body is definitely showing it’s age.  Or really, it’s showing it’s age plus 40.

Saturday, as I was bending sideways to set an empty laundry basket on a chair a pain akin to being stabbed hit my lower back.  This isn’t anything new, as it happened Labor Day 2008, but it wasn’t like I was expecting it, either.

By limiting what I did and taking Tylenol at regular intervals, I was able to tolerate the pain with a slow, limping gate.  I thought I was on the mend, but then after a night of waking up every time I wanted to roll over because I couldn’t (I’m a very active sleeper, apparently), I realized that I had a problem.

It took everything I had to get out of the bed in the morning.

Perhaps I would have continued to wait it out on a normal week, but knowing that I’m scheduled to board a plane in the wee hours of Wednesday morning (can you imagine walking–let alone hauling luggage–through the airport like this?), I had to seek treatment.

So instead of heading off to my Sunday school Christmas party, I headed out to a nearby urgent care.  The doctor was great and easily detected the muscle spasm.  I’m now on a course of steroids and have muscle relaxers that I only plan on taking to sleep.

With the muscle relaxer, I was able to sleep well last night and even could get out of bed when the alarm went off.  Though under the influence of the drug (at least that’s what I’ll blame it on), I decided to push back my wakeup alarm 3o minutes.  Not sure why I made that decision, though I do remember doing it.

So, here’s to getting better!  Between the bum back and the end of the cold, I think I’m ready for work…where I am going to be filmed for a video to play in our waiting area.

Let’s just hope I still have my voice.

Laboring on Labor Day

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So one major thing happened this weekend that I was absolutely not expecting. A couple of hours into my Saturday, I realized that I had lower back pain that was severe enough I could barely move it. I could only walk like a 90-year-old man: in baby steps, leaning on anything within reach, and taking breaks every few steps. This pain continued into the afternoon and slowly let up to where I could walk almost normally (yet with a lot of pain) by the evening. Sunday it loosened up some (thankfully, since I work several hours with the kids). The pain is still there now, but it is less crippling and more of a nuisance and a bother, limiting bending down and extended periods of movement. Who knew you could age 50 years in one day?

So now you know what I have not been doing this weekend. Not that water skiing or marathon running was really on the schedule anyway. Really, the back pain has hardly affected my plan for work this weekend. So don’t feel bad for me. There are plenty of people who are actually laboring on Labor Day. I’m merely doing what I love: reading. So far this holiday weekend I have:

  • Read 200 pages of Ed Welch’s Depression: a Stubborn Darkness, to finish it
  • Read 1 chapter of Don Whitney’s Spiritual Disciplines for the Christian Life
  • Read 60 pages of Alvin Reid’s Intro to Evangelism
  • Read 60 pages of Will McRaney’s Art of Personal Evangelism
  • Read 50 pages of Robin Gaby Fisher’s After the Fire (heads up: I’ll be doing a giveaway of this book when I’m done!)
  • Read 90 pages of AJ Jacobs’s Year of Living Biblically
  • Read 40 pages of Julie Lessman’s A Passion Most Pure
  • Read 30 pages of Andrew Murray’s Humility
  • Done 2 loads of laundry (seems out of place, but there you have it)

Hmm. When you put it that way, it looks like I’ve done a ton! I would still like to:

  • Read 2 chapters of Spiritual Disciplines
  • Read 30 pages of Humility, to finish it
  • Read 30 pages of A Passion Most Pure
  • Read 55 pages of Art of Personal Evangelism
  • Read bits of other books, too
  • Unpack

Considering I barely did anything Sunday, it’s looking like a very productive weekend! What have you been up to? Did you use Labor Day as a fun holiday or a work holiday?