golden

a little over a year ago, i developed a severe pain in my right hip. well, actually in both hips, but more so on the right. it mainly seemed to appear after running and actually served as a pretty powerful deterrent to that end. i've never been a big long distance runner, but i did run a few miles at a time, a few times a week, pretty regularly for a while there. and then i discovered spin and fell in love with it.

my running was replaced with spin and, as i'm prone to do, i jumped in headfirst, fully immersing myself in five classes a week. which didn't leave much time in my cardio plan for running. oh well, no big loss. or so i thought.

after about six months (or more?) of spinning four to five times a week, one day i hopped on the treadmill. it wasn't hard to bang out a couple of miles and i remember patting myself on the back, thinking that spin hadn't ruined me for everything else. (i'm fully aware of the importance of variety in an exercise routine after all.)

until the next morning.
when i could barely walk.
suddenly i was 110 years old with a bum hip.

i immediately assumed that i'd developed some sort of muscular imbalance from spinning so long and that more running would rebuild and remedy the issue. but it didn't turn out to be that simple. after running more and spinning less for a while, i saw a sports medicine doctor. and a physical therapist. neither were clear what the issue was, but i learned some stretches and exercises that i could do to try and help. long story short - it would have taken much more time than i was willing to commit to try and find the elusive cure.

however, the best thing the PT gave me was a transdermal anti-inflammatory patch to stick on my hip, called flector. that thing was amazing. wow. like a cortisone shot (oh i got one of those too) without the needle.

it's been well over a year now and the pain comes and goes depending on the amount of running i'm doing. spring tennis means that my hip is killing me, but it's starting to feel normal. as in, the pain feels normal. if it didn't hurt i probably wouldn't know what to do.

haley has a similar ailment with her knees. intermittent (less inter and more mittent, truth be told) pain in both knees; aggravated by tennis and her stair-climbing job. i gave her a flector patch last night (i recently filled a prescription for them - may as well, while i still have insurance, right?) and this morning she woke up and exclaimed, 'my knees don't hurt! i can't remember them feeling this good!!'

between the two of us and our joint pain, we're hobbling around like golden girls. i always loved that tv show when i was a kid. i doubt that young girls were the target audience, but it was one of my favorite sitcoms, back when sitcoms were the rage.

and in fact, many times (as an adult) i've daydreamed about my fifties. (i can't believe i'm admitting this.) i've always looked at women at that age, whether in the workplace or elsewhere, and envied them a bit. it seems that around that time there's more wisdom and serenity. more calm and less wave. more deep bonds and less drama. more confidence and less worry. more play and less work. yes, it's always been a stage of life that i think will be fun.

and, perhaps best of all, it's the second half. it seems to me that we have to do much more of the hard stuff in this first half. grow up. get an education. find a partner. raise children. make a living. build a home. never mind all the emotional growth that's overarching these basic processes.

and the second half? well, physical pain i guess. and death. (everyone else's, i mean)
yes, the second half is decidedly golden in comparison.

golden girls. golden years.
i generally prefer silver, but this may be the exception.

d: a sneak preview of golden wisdom, in equal measure to my early golden pain
b: my pain threshold is rising, in preparation for my golden years
g: flector. yes. flector.