So, I've begun going to Tai Chi classes at the YMCA. All the classes are free with my membership but I keep chickening out of going. It's scary being new and a lot worse than everyone else (especially when most everyone else is your grandparents' age- like in Tai Chi). I used to to yoga pretty regularly but I hurt my back doing the Sun Salutation:
Skip to a minute-ish in and watch on mute- she can't seem to stop talking!
That early move where you bend backward really far to stretch is what hurt the already injured area. It made the pain radiate down my left arm all the way to my fingertips. So, I stopped doing yoga. Too much unpleasant stretching!
Anyway, Tai Chi is really nice so far (I've only gone twice though, so what do I know?). I'm a lot younger than everyone else and a lot less skilled, but everyone is pretty friendly and welcoming, and the instructor is very attractive, though much older than me as well. Everything is slow and you aren't supposed to stretch beyond what you feel comfortable with. Also, the instructor is careful to watch that no one's doing any motions/mistaking poses in a manner that might lead to injury. I wish I was a fast learner though! Octogenarians are making me look bad... Anyway, the exercise is long but low intensity, and you get a lot of stretching and strength work. And balance- which I have none of since I quit doing yoga. One day I will fall down in class and be the laughing stock of young folk everywhere! Nightmares will come of this notion.
Also, I have plans to see my back doctor again. Apparently, I haven't seen him in over a year, which is pretty terrible and negligent of me, but when you've had an injury so long as me and nothing seems to make it better, it sort of begins to feel like a waste of time. But it won't be!!! (the two extra exclamation points are meant to illustrate for you the fact that I wave my fist in the air as I say this, a bit socialistically). I intend to (for the third time... oh dear) get a prescription/referral for acupuncture. I am terrified of needles, especially in the context of reuse, which some acupuncture places will do (though I am told they are well-cleaned). Nonetheless, I have a severe panic at the thought of sharing needles, clean or no, so have failed to use my past referrals to have needles shoved into my skin (that sentence may have been a bit biased). But I am told now that Japanese acupuncture uses new needles every time and that they are very small. So, I really ought to go and give it a whirl, since that, with chiropracty... chiropracy... chiropractics... (ah, my spell check let's that one slide), are the only things I haven't much gone for. When it is less nearing-the-middle-of-the-night-ish, I will post all that I have attempted! So, acupuncture it is!
Will also be getting a massage as part of a spa treatment I got for graduation (in June). Massages never ever remotely helped before, and sometimes even made things worse, but I am optimistic that this time, it'll be blue skies. At least my skin will look nice, right?
Must go to bed now because I have Tai Chi at 7:30! Gasp! Unless I turn out to be a secret slug and ignore my alarm clock. Hrm.
Pain: 8
Emotion: 8
