Hi Everyone! Welcome to my first blog post. As a past collegiate athlete, you can imagine that I have had my fair share of injuries and recovery. It is often joked that I should have my own table at my physical therapy facility. Recently though, I have experienced another serious injury that required surgery to repair my Achilles tendon. Crutches and limited movement has made rehabilitation frustrating at times as well as there is always that lingering fear of re-injury as you go through the recovery process. Anyone who has experienced crutches understands the physical limitations as well as the experience of non-weight bearing challenges that go hand in hand. You definitely become dependent upon a solid support group to help and aide in your recovery limitations and challenges.
There are so many sayings and cliches that you hear when facing injury recovery and sometimes it can be frustrating to hear them. For example, "when life gives you lemons, make lemonade." What happens if you don't want the lemonade? It isn't always easy to accept the situation for what it is and how it impacts your life. Seeing the negative versus the positive is the easier route to travel and often hard to escape. Sometimes addressing it for what it is, whether it be a curve ball, an unexpected bump, or an awful situation that you weren't expecting and aren't necessarily prepared or willing to face. It's okay to be upset, frustrated, angry, and scared when facing an injury and while going through the recovery process. Working through the mental side and emotions is as important as the physical recovery. I know that throughout this injury I have had good days where I feel like I am progressing and days when I am frustrated by the physical limitations and not being able to complete simple tasks like walking up and down the stairs or carrying a glass of water without spilling it.
They say that it is often difficult to practice what you preach and in other words to take your own "good" advice as I find to be the case sometimes during my personal recovery. The mind is a powerful thing and how it links with our physical abilities is quite remarkable. When going from a more advanced physical state to a very basic physical state, it can be hard and frustrating to perform such tasks and feel out of sync. You will definitely have good recovery days and bad ones that challenge not only your emotions, but your outlook. Especially during recovery from injuries that takes months versus a few days or weeks. Finding a way to tweak this is important as well as being okay with accepting the challenges for what they are and knowing that not everyday is going to be perfect and progressing the way that you want. Taking some of this control back and previewing challenges can aide in setting smaller goals and taking the recovery process from a more present standpoint and day by day versus beginning to end. Jumping ahead can make it seem impossible and just increase negative feelings.
Although, through this recovery I have tried thinking back to how limited I was post-op and to where I am now and it makes me realize how far I have come and that I have made progress. What makes this hard is when others ask when you will be at a certain stage of recovery that isn't quite when you wish it would be as well. In my case being off of my crutches and being able to stand and walk so that I can perform at my job the way that I used to. This I find challenging because it has forced me to rely on others and relinquish some control over my work, which isn't always easy.
Well, those are my thoughts for today. Until we speak again! Ciao
