Addicted to Exercise

Oh, that title looks so silly, but it's the honest truth.  Somehow, in the past month, I have become an exercise addict.  Seriously.  I went to the gym twice today.  On Wednesday, I'm planning to go twice again, weights in the morning (45 min), Tai Chi in the afternoon (one hour), and then my usual cardio with stairclimber and eliptical (1 hour).  I feel a bit like I'm waiting for the ebb to come ripping me back out to sea (how's that for a metaphor?), but so far, all is good.

The thing I noticed recently was that my neck doesn't hurt when I'm really working out.  Sweat slicking back my bangs working out.  It stops hurting for a bit, so I just want to prolong it.  I'm sure this will lead to other things-- my neck, the boney part, was hurting this weekend.  What's that about?  There was joint pain down my spine, but the muscle was fine.  But I didn't really care about that pain-- so much less than what I'm used to.  And this kind of muscle pain is nice.

I've also realized that my mind works better if I read while doing cardio.  I know it sounds like that would detract from the work out, but somehow it makes it more intense.  Not sure how that works out.  I've been reading C.S. Lewis' The Problem of Pain and Greenberg's The Body Broken while working out this week.  The theological text was a little rough at first, but no worries.  I'll need to do an overview when I'm done.  Greenberg's text is pretty alarming-- the idea of having a terrible accident then feeling better for twenty years and having it all come back.  It's my worst nightmare- if ever I get through this-- the idea of it returning someday.

Anyway, I'm thinking of training for a triathlon, since I'm going to be working out so much for temporary pain relief anyway.  I know it's a little sad, because I'm only addicted to the passing cessation of pain, but I'll take what I can get.  Especially since I'll be going to PT for the third or forth go around (not session, understand, but entirely new PT and series of sessions), and have no hope that it will help.

But then, there's also the whole being booted from your disability community if your disability heals.  I should do a post on that sometime- hm....