I’ve not bothered with daily updates on my shoulder because the improvement is so incremental, sometimes not at all noticeable, other times it is as if I have gone backwards with recuperation of this blasted broken shoulder.

Today is Day 47 so time for a broken shoulder update!

I just returned from Orlando, FL last night. I spent the day traveling and am surprised my arm isn’t more sore than it is, and currently it is not that sore.

A week in a warm and humid climate did wonders for my shoulder (and arm, and back as they are both aggravated too due to accommodating my shoulder in ways they are not used to). From the moment I stepped off the plane I noticed an improvement in stiffness and mobility. I think I took one dose of extra strength Tylenol the whole time I was there. I’ve been off the good drugs for a while now and really want to be off the Tylenol so I am learning to live with the pain.

Each day is better. Each day I tell myself that it will be better than the day before. Sometimes it is, sometimes it isn’t, but since I can’t relive pain I really can’t tell.

I don’t measure progress by pain. Especially living in this frozen tundra – currently -2°F because the cold makes everything worse. There’s also a fresh coat of ice that fell the day before yesterday which makes me nervous (and tensed up) about walking on it.

A huge shout out to my neighbor Steve for shoveling my walk (front, back and driveway) every time it has snowed in the last 47 days.

It has snowed a lot in the last 47 days.

I’m so fortunate to have such great neighbors.

Back to the broken shoulder update. Today I was able to apply deodorant to my left armpit with my right hand. That is a huge deal because for 46 days I have not been able to do that and have instead been applying my left pit with my left hand and that isn’t easy either.

I can now type with both hands, though still making a lot of mistakes and mousing is still challenging. Sometimes I find I just go back to using my left hand because it is easier and faster, but my physical therapist says I have to use my arm to do the things I usually do.

I can’t life my arm above my head, not even close, but no one is expecting that for a while. Likewise I can’t lift much with it. Currently I am sleeping with a Build a Bear moose under my right arm so I can sleep on my left side. If I change positions to my back and want to move my moose it’s difficult to lift him to move him. He’s not a big moose, has to weight less than a pound, but moving him from side to side while lying down is nearly impossible.

Build a Bear Moose

Ditto when I wake up to the cat sleeping on my arm, I can’t move her – she weighs more than a pound – a lot more.

That’s the weird thing about this. I can put weight on my shoulder and it doesn’t hurt. My arm is still tender – like it is when you get a sunburn, but it can take a fair amount of pressure applied to it.

I tell myself the pain is not actually pain, it’s just weakness in my muscles. And pain is weakness leaving your body.

I’m pretty sure I saw that on some buff dude’s t-shirt at the gym once.

A lot of this is just mind over matter. I just have to do it.

I was nervous about flying to Orlando and renting a car. I was especially nervous about getting in late and having to drive to my hotel in an area I didn’t know at all – oh, and it was supposed to be raining. Thankfully, it was not raining.

All of the things I was nervous about went off without a hitch, but the anxiety is still there, even though I am keeping it to the fringes of my over active imagination.

I know I keep saying this but when the ground is no longer frozen things will be much better. I got a taste of it in Orlando and now wonder why I live in this place in the winters. I understand why people winter down there.

Not that I would in Orlando, but Miami sounds nice. Who wants to Golden Girls with me?

Wordle 238 5/6

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