Bench, rowing, swim ladder

I'm starting to see the potential silver lining in the one-legged situation in terms of swimming and upper body strength. I'm back working with Jake at the gym, I signed up for the February bench press competition so I have a focus and goal, and starting Monday I am moving ahead with a swim block with Jim.

I used the rower at the gym and that worked fine so that's a good cardio option. And today I had a real honest-to-goodness swim workout.  I can't believe what a non-issue swimming is (other than the funny looks I get crutching to the pool).  I did a 100-200-300-200-100 ladder, swimming those at upper aerobic intensity, and followed each interval with a half-distance easy aerobic recovery swim.  So it was 100-50-200-100....  I got stronger with each. With the pull buoy, I feel like I have NO excuse for not leaving a goggle in the water when I breathe or for keeping high elbows in the catch/pull. This could be just what I needed to fix some bad habits.

After a rough first week with calf cramps, pain, sleep issues, negativity, frustration, and moments of despair, I think the worst is behind me. One week down....

All I want for Christmas....

....is five minute out of this stupid cast to stretch just a little!!!

I should be sitting here awash in Christmas spirit, soaking up the spirit of the holiday and the excitement of my kids. Instead, I am shoving a wooden spoon down the back of the cast trying to figure out how (if at all) to diminish this monster calf cramp that is near-constant. I would like to jump out of my own skin.  I am beginning to think the whole idea of a "cast" is entirely medieval and more "old wives tale" than science.

As of this morning, I still had all the gifts left to wrap.  I woke up at my usual 5 am and figured there was no better time to do it.  Then I realized all the gift wrapping supplies were on the main floor, and all the gifts were in the basement in our locked space under the stairs. I should have planned ahead.  It took five trips up and down the stairs on my butt, but I got everything essential moved - wrapping paper, tape, ribbon, coffee, iPad to watch the Biggest Loser for entertainment....

If you are looking for a great tricep workout you can do at home, go backward up your steps on your hands and one foot a few times. I highly recommend it.

Then I had a really enjoyable hour and a half of wrapping, thinking about each gift and the recipient.

Later in the day, each child in turn joined me in the basement and we wrapped the stocking stuffers each had gotten for his brother.  That was a great moment!  A new tradition has been born as they loved shopping and wrapping for each other.

I did a LOT of sitting/laying around today.  Oh, except for that hour at the gym with another no-mercy Kurt Weidner workout for shoulders and triceps.  So now my entire upper body has been thoroughly brutalized over the last two days. The legs are jealous and sulking.

Time to wind down and catch some Christmas Eve sleep.  No doubt it will be an early morning!

Acceptance and adjustments.

 

Today started off well with the swim and a strength training workout with professional bodybuilder Kurt Weidner at the Weight Club (Jake is still out of town).  I'm pretty sure you could show up in a full-body cast and the guy would show no mercy.  Perfect!  I worked back and biceps and left in a much better mindset (it wasn't hard to improve on the fact that I was choking back tears on the way in).

Later I took the kids to Target to shop for stocking stuffers for each other. It left me exhausted, my leg was swollen, toes were purple, and I was done.  I got home, propped the foot up and didn't move for two hours.

I remember this pivotal moment the last time I was on crutches.  This was the moment when I realized I can't keep up the same pace of life without going to bed at 4 pm.  Time to make some adjustments.  Chill out more.  Run around less. Accept that my "training" right now is a lot of resting and healing.

I struck a deal with the kids.  I would try to refrain from barking out a constant stream of orders (pick up this, get me that...) but rather I would collect up and save all the commands, then, a few times a day, spew them all out.  They promise to run around and do what I tell them for 10 minutes at a pop.  So far so good. They think it's a game!!

So when you are sitting around "resting" and "healing" and have a laptop, you fill your time with things like Googling "fibular stress fracture". Ever wonder who works their way through to page 14 of the results? Down to the really obscure stuff?  Me! I read a big long thread on a runner's forum where one person after another posted that by trying to cross-train or run through a stress fx, they only delayed healing.  Things only improved when they totally backed off.  So maybe my doc is onto something by taking the choice out of my hands.  I will probably be glad he stood firmly against my desperate protesting.

I can swim!!!

I made my way to the pool this morning at 6:30 am.  I slept horribly last night, partly because this cast makes sleeping comfortably a challenge, and partly because I was excited to get to the pool.

I successfully hopped on one foot from where I deposited the crutches to the pool side, and maneuvered my gear along the pool wall to a lane. I tried tying the pull buoy to my leg with the stretchy band I use for drills, but it wouldn't stay on so I just used it the regular way, which seems to be the way to go. 

Normally with the pull buoy, and resulting elevation of the back end, you feel like you could swim forever, but combined with the drag of the cast, it made swimming slightly tougher than normal, yet the stroke mechanics were largely unaffected.  I proceeded on with some basic drills - 1 armed swimming, catch-up drill, fist swimming, fingertip drag - and then a few sets of 100's. No doubt this will be a great upper body workout.

Between the lack of sleep and physical adjustment to the crutches, this was not the day to push things. I am excited and hopeful to know I can likely maintain and maybe even improve, my swimming some during this time.

I have no excuses not to work on leaving a goggle in the water and using the "cigar mouth" to breathe.

There really could be some good to come out of all of this.

1 day down, 27 more to go.

Well I enjoyed my four whole gym workouts, conceived and executed all by my little self.  (See Winter Training for my big, but brief, leap into self-managed workouts).  It's back to supervised training because without help, I am relegated to a limited number of machines for anything with weight. Thanks Kurt and Jake who will make it possible to use barbells, dumbbells, and plate-loaded machines.

If you find yourself with a cast and crutches, here are my suggestions, which I can confidently provide now that I am in...ding-ding-ding....Round 2... of this nonsense.

• Get the doc to fill out paperwork, pay $5 at the DMV, and get a temporary handicapped hangtag.  You'll need the energy for life's essential activities, not for walking from the far reaches of the parking lot.
• Get fun socks.  This is a must in the cold weather.  And even more critical if the casted leg happens to contain a regrowing half-toenail that could scare small children and pets.
• Learn to walk by throwing the crutches forward with body momentum, freeing up hands to carry dishes, coffee, paper, laundry.  Because even if you get great help that first day or two, it will diminish exponentially and by day four, most help is gone. 
• Take NO chances with stairs.  Falling down the stairs with an immobilized limb is terrifying. Best is crutches in one hand, stair rail in the other.

Back to the gym tomorrow and a go at the POOL!!!!!  Please just don't let me slip on the pool deck.