2 Months

I'm disappointed!  Depending on how I count the day I fell and today, it has been 2 months since I fell.   It is starting to feel like this may never end, and I have this worry I'm as "good as I'm going to get".  Or next month I may look back on this post and laugh as I do cartwheels on the lawn or carry a big laundry basket down the stairs easily.  But not yet...

I had some problems before I fell.  I was routinely getting leg and rib muscle cramps for a decade.  I had involuntary finger-clench cramps, but usually only after doing hard gripping of tools.  Oddly enough, those went away for weeks.  Well, they are back.  Maybe the muscles were shocked from the fall and are recovering.  

And I'm feeling sorer around my lower back and (coff, coff) butt than earlier this week.  It moves around some though.  Maybe that's a good sign of healing, but I could do without it.  I'm walking a bit stiffer again.  Maybe it is that I stopped taking even Ibuprophen last week.  I may start a daily OTC dosage again.  If it is the same in a week, I'll call my primary care Dr.  

But it is really annoying to get worse after getting better.  Maybe that's normal; 2 steps forward, one back.  As I've said, I don't have much experience with lingering problems.  Maybe I've been walking too much or too little.  Maybe I've been comfortable enough to sit awkwardly lately.

My right arm is weaker than I realized.  I have some simple platforms I use to adjust seedling tray heights under my basement shelf stand lights.  They were originally just glued together and I screwed some in place last year.  I missed a few (probably in use at the time).  Well, one came loose and I decided to check (and screw) all of them.

It was harder than I thought!  I had to use both hands to hold the drill upright and straight.  And pulling the drill bit OUT took some effort (which normally requires no effort at all).  At least pushing DOWN on the screws as I drove them in wasn't a problem.  Drill straight and pull out, bad.  Screw in, good.  Well, at least I got them all reinforced...

So it was time to make dinner.  Pork stew (tastes better than it sounds) and a tossed salad.  But more cutting and chopping.  But more gripping the knife handles.  More finger-clenches...  I had to physically pull some fingers back into place.  

Ever had a basic recipe you've made a 100 times and one time it just doesn't work?  Last night was like that.  The potatoes and carrots in the stew wouldn't soften!  I even put it all in a bowl and M/W it 3 more minutes.  Still not stew-soft.  I ate it anyway while watching TV.  I like good food, but sometimes (so long as it is not spoiled), I'll eat what I end up with.  

2 hours later, I realized I had a pork roast (Boston Butt) and chicken that needed to be marinated for cooking later today before it went bad.  More slicing and knife-gripping!  I slice the big pork chunk into 2" slabs for smoking and cube them later when they cool.  The chicken is boneless/skinless but also gets smoked.  

After slicing, I made a dry rub mix.  It works on both pork and chicken.  More grabbing stuff with the hands...  I don't have a "special recipe" but ask if you want the general mix of stuff.  I just "guesstimate" each time.

I really packed it on this time!  I'm not a spicy-hot type of cook, but brown sugar, salt, cinnamon, etc can  add a lot of flavor.  But by the time I was done and had the meat back in the fridge, my fingers were going all whichway.  

Thank goodness for NSAID muscle rubs.  I had to slather it on my hands and it took 15 minutes to take effect, but it did.  Otherwise, I would not be typing now...

Which leads me to the last thing for today.  Typing causes the finger-clenches the most.  The muscle rub is working for now, but I'm finding it hard to post every day and visit as often as I would wish.  I appreciate the visits from you.  

I will get back into a more regular habit of posting and visiting as soon as I can.  And after smoking an 8 lb pork roast, 12 chicken thighs, and having frozen steaks and shrimp in the freezer, I will not be doing serious "slicing and dicing" for a while).

Each day, I expect "next week" will be a lot better.  And I expect that, one week, that will be true.  I'm so very much looking forward to that week.