A Big Step Backwards
In my never-ending quest to ward off osteoporosis, I started on a program of good old-fashioned pushups. I wrote about it a few months back, about how I couldn’t do any of the standard ones, and could do but a few from my knees. Back in the day, we called these “girl pushups”. And I was having a difficult time with these.
My dismay at this turn of events was matched only by my determination and creativity. I looked at my kitchen counter and tried doing the exercise from there, placing my hands on the edge and moving my feet back so my body was at about a 45-degree angle. It worked. I would do knee pushups until I could do no more (this was about 15 or so at the outset of my experiment) and then I’d switch to the counter variety. I figured that I’d keep to this routine until I could reliably do 20 of the knee variety.
I got to 20 fairly soon, in just about two or three weeks. I bid a fond farewell to my kitchen countertop and got as high as 28 knee pushups, only rarely not making 25. About once a week, I’d check my progress by trying the regular variety. I found that four to six was the norm. Then, about a month ago, I noticed something that should have been a distressing warning sign. My shoulders began to ache as I did these, and also as I did my knee pushups. Fool that I am, I tried to work through this. I was enjoying my progress too much to cut back.
Now I’m finding that both shoulders, more notably my left one, have lost significant mobility, feeling like my left one did when it needed rotator cuff surgery many years ago. I recall that the recovery from that surgery took longer than I thought it would, and it delayed my making black belt by half a year. That’s the nature of the beast. A few years later, the problem returned, but this time I was able to work through the problem with physical therapy. The therapist also fixed some back problems I was having.
So it was that in the middle of my knee problems, I mentioned my shoulder problem to my therapist, and how I’d put my pushup regimen on hold. Yeah, it was likely that I simply didn’t pace my progress the way I should have. He had an idea that he must have thought would sound innovative to me. You’ve probably guessed by now, it was to find a surface maybe three feet high, put my hands there, and do pushups accordingly. Back to the kitchen counter for me. A giant step backwards.
In the middle of this, I took a pass at doing some overdue weeding. The rain was actually pretty heavy this last winter, and they were pretty bad. I weeded the area in front of my house out over four days, a little over an hour each.
The Physical Shin
Last update: April 6, 2024
The John Shinnick Website
Even these knee pushups were too much for me.
Apparently some doctors recommend not doing pushups of any kind after about age 50. I'm inclined to agree.
Predictably, my lower back started to hurt. Unpredicted was that it seemed to get worse over time. My fear was that my knee exercises might have been exacerbating the problem. Four of these exercises are done on the floor (getting down there and then getting back up is painful in its own right, and one in particular causes me to arch my back. Sunday morning, I had to play bass at church, and I needed to be seated to make it less painful. That afternoon, my daily walk was compromised to where I only did about a quarter of the normal two-mile distance. It felt like just sore muscles, but ouch!
My therapist can’t continue looking at my shoulder, since the original doctor slip said my visits would be for my knee. My knee is by now a distant third in my list of maladies for which PT could be directed. For now, insurance only covers one, though my therapist was good enough to treat what was hurting in my last session. I’m hoping I can deal with my PA to get her to change the authorization without having to go in yet again for an exam to verify my new aches and pains.
Note: in the few days since I wrote the above story, my back has gotten much better. My shoulder, not so much. Watch this space.
