Letters to you

My orthopedic surgeon who put my wrist back together. Fresh out of school, all kinds of new ideas. Eh well, maybe it's for the best - my physical therapist said that people would kill to get the range of motion back that I now have.

Range of motion - about 10 degrees short of full range forward bend, full range everywhere else. I gained 15 degrees in the forward bend in the past two weeks, so that should be corrected shortly.

Grip strength - needs work. My right hand grip reads 60 on the gauge and my left hand reads 40. The left is normally about 5-10% weaker than the right, but this is more like 30% weaker. I have a couple of exercises to do with silly putty and elastic bands... Hopefully two weeks from now when we measure again, it will have improved.

Lifting strength - even at 5 and 5 for both hands. The right can actually lift a lot more, but waiting for lefty to catch up before increasing. The left arm still looks like spaghetti (less so than before but still) and has difficulty lifting five in certain directions. For example if I do lateral raises, after two sets of ten reps each, the left arm (not hand, oddly enough) starts to lag. But it can do it (it's not like I'm giving it a whole lot of choice)...

Started taking advantage of gym at work for treadmill, stairmaster, machines, and free weights.

Edit: So I was just at the gym. Both arms can now lift 8. The right arm has no problem with 8, the left is "training to failure" as they say in the parlance. By contrast, the lower body. A few weeks ago I started with maybe 65 pounds - not much at all (the leg press is what they start you on to make you think you're lifting a lot of weight). The interesting part is the increase in just two weeks. Today the usual 120 was starting to feel a bit light. I increased it up to 160 thinking maybe it would get heavier. It didn't. Then I increased it over 200, upward to 260 by increments. Still light. Then I increased it to 300. Starting to offer some resistance. I just leg pressed 300 pounds. Probably not very impressive, but I'm beginning to think this stuff really works.

The physical therapist said I was 'almost normal' at this point and only have to go hand therapy once a week now. It was weird. On the one hand it will be great not to have to go in as often. On the other hand I think I'll miss getting my hand pampered for a half an hour twice a week.

I've graduated the left hand to lifting three pounds now. I plan to wait on increasing the right hand's weight until the left hand catches up with it, so they'll both be even. That should take about another week.

The new weight routine is already starting to make a difference in the way I feel. I'd crept up a few pounds due to inactivity, which did not make me happy. Didn't take long to lose it again once I started getting serious with the weights, though. The left arm no longer looks like spaghetti. I'm pretty confident that at this stage, the weights, some tai-chi exercises, and calcium/magnesium/boron supplements will stabilize the system for a while.

A few days ago, our new set of three Gabrielle Roth DVDs arrived (The Wave, Inner Wave, and Power Wave). We had a couple of her CDs and books (rialian has always liked her) but we never knew about the DVDs until a friend showed them to us (thanks!) So... we've been doing her dance meditations for a couple of days now. The main benefit of these DVDs is that they are a great excuse to move around (should someone need an excuse). Motion is a prerequisite to all sorts of good things like relaxing sore muscles, weight loss, health, longevity, etc.