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Tuesday, January 15, 2008

Stiff Hips

Walking out the front door to a sunny day and mild breeze it felt more like California than it had in weeks. And I was struck by the notion to walk instead of taking a bike ride, wanting to take my time instead of flying by everything on a whirl of wheels, the better to enjoy the weather. I had my earbuds in, connected to a CD player, so just held on to the player while I walked. One of the many projects I have left undone is replacing the battery in my ipod; I have the replacement battery that I ordered months ago, but somehow it’s never the right time to actually do the work – the story of my life these past few years. I keep intending to make a big to do list, but I can’t seem to get it from my brain to paper. I did start to clean my office today, sorting through mail, taking year end inventory of my Orenda products, sorting audio books between private and library. Amazing how much stuff can fit in one little room, piles of “I’ll do that later” sitting here and there cluttering up the space until I can hardly breathe. How I digress…..so, back to my walk, I head down the driveway and turn left heading towards the golf course. During December I took a few short walks to see how my feet would hold up – I think my plantar faciitis is gone but I haven’t been out walking long enough to really test it out. And today will be no different, my hips are so stiff I feel like I am crippled from having spent so many hours, days and years curled up on the couch reading and watching television and it’s all I can do to walk four blocks over and back. First it was my back injury, then my feet, then my sorrow, and now my knee. I feel like I am Charlie Brown listening to Lucy saying “Good Grief” with her arms thrown up in frustration. The good news is that my knee is more flexible, and if I am careful there is no pain in normal movements, and I’m able to go up and down curbs without wincing. But the stiffness in my hips is bothering me, and I’m unable to take long healthy strides. Short halting steps seem to be the best I can do, and I add another item to my mental list: do more stretching exercises! Once home I sit down at the computer to whine and moan, thinking about all the details I have to pay attention to just trying to find my way back to normal. Eat right (research, shop, cook, journal) stretch, exercise, take my supplements, get enough daylight (use the full spectrum light in the office on dark days) take time to be quiet – which should be easy given my current schedule but it’s not, it’s much easier to play solitaire than sit quiet and just breathe for ten minutes while imagining every organ in my body smiling. So my ranting and raving is about stiff hips, and how this is the direct result of my sedentary lifestyle and a page right out of ‘use it or lose it’. I have got to start moving more, I’ve been so focused on changing my eating towards a plant based diet that I have been ignoring the rest of my life. Yes, I have some physical limitations, but certainly I can be doing more, just moving more in general would be helpful. I need to test the waters more and see what I am capable of now; I need to move!

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