Shoulder Status: After 11 Weeks

Hey friends!!!

(Whoa, Stephanie, 3 exclamation marks? Really?) Sure, why not?

I’m doing well. Still on leave, more about that later. Here’s an update on my shoulder and life.

Shoulder

Last week was very rough on me in terms of pain. Starting last Tuesday the 20th, I had this active soreness in my shoulder and arm for 6 days straight.

My doctor’s appointment was on the 22nd, and he was going to release me to go back to work this week. I told him I couldn’t possibly. There are multiple situations in my job every day where I have to lift something out of my trunk, carry something awkward while opening a heavy door, contort myself in a weird position to reach something, or arrange furniture.

So he extended my leave until April 15th. He said that, when I’m feeling strong enough, I can just let him know and he’ll release me.

That made me feel better in terms of my shoulder but sad about work. I don’t think it will really take me until April 15th to finally be strong enough…but it could.

I explained that situation to my PT on Tuesday of this week and they changed my exercises a little. I did fewer exercises, but more reps. 4 sets of 10 of everything instead of 3 sets of 10.

I wasn’t too sore from that, but today they added seated rows, pull-downs (is that what they’re called?) and WALL PUSH-UPS.

Wall push-ups are freaking brutal. The push-up motion was my main source of pain before the surgery, because of where my injury was. But it doesn’t feel so obviously wrong like it did before. Now it just feels like I’m weak but can build strength in this part of my body.

And I have official homework now – I have to do the rotator cuff strengthening exercises and wall push-ups every day.

YAY.

I know for sure I’m going to be sore for a few days. My therapist said that’s to be expected, and I should keep doing the best I can.

Getting Stuff Done

I made another chore chart for the past two weeks, and will make a new one today. It’s working! I’ve been building good cleaning habits.

The stuff on the left side is what should be done every day. The stuff on the right side is not as necessary, but I still want to track it.

Assessment for this round? Pretty good. I didn’t get much done last week because I was in so much pain, I truly just sat around and watched YouTube videos.

I got some REALLY big projects done. I actually cleared my desk so I can now use it as a functioning work space.

It’s far from where I want it to eventually be, but this is a huge step in the right direction.

I cleaned my car. Like I mentioned in My Messy Mindset, someday I’ll be a person to whom nobody will ever mention my car’s cleanliness. But because it being clean is such a contrast to what it’s often been, on Sunday a friend of mine did say, “Wait…is this your car?”

I’ve posted a lot of giveaway stuff on the Facebook marketplace. It’s been good but I’ve learned it’s best to just put a few items up at a time. Too many and I lose track of who claimed what.

BUT, I made $48 and got rid of stuff.

I didn’t practice trumpet very much last week because of the pain. I only blogged once in two weeks, whoops. And I only stretched my legs once.

Overall, though, this is helping me get stuff done. For my next chart I’m going to include the different shoulder exercises, and new projects. 🙂

Trash Walks

I am amazed that there continues to be new trash on my neighborhood streets only days after I do a sweep through.

Some student at a nearby high school left a full Styrofoam coffee cup of something on an electrical box, and I chose not to pick it up out of spite. If that person walked by there once, they should have to walk by there again and face the ugliness of that terrible choice.

That is not big of me, but it’s too ridiculous of a thing for me to pick up without it staying there for several days. Teenagers need to learn to clean up their own gross messes.

Here is what I’ve decided about picking up trash: For everything my house uses that comes in a plastic bag, that plastic bag will be repurposed to pick up trash on the sidewalks.

We’ve been pretty good about using our own containers to buy in bulk, but there are still some things that are very hard to find plastic-free where we live. Like bread – I could live without spongy sliced bread in my life, but my sweet husband cannot. So that packaging goes toward picking up trash as a compromise.

YouTube

I’ve been inspired by a handful of YouTube channels lately. Admittedly, they are mostly lifestyle-related channels – sustainable living, minimalism, veganism. But it got me thinking.

I have a lot to share in my world, too. And maybe it would help me take a more disciplined approach to my music practice and songwriting if I had an obligation to post to a channel. Maybe I would be more inclined to make my work the best it could be.

So I revived my old YouTube Channel. I wanted to change the name but I guess it won’t let me. I’ll have Original Mondays, Windy Wednesdays, and Freestyle Fridays.

On Original Mondays, I will perform a song I wrote. Songwriting used to be an important creative outlet for me in college. I love writing songs because it juxtaposes poetry (economy of words) and sound organization – you can choose which words will have the most impact based on where you put them in the song.

I haven’t been disciplined in songwriting the way I’d like to be, so I thought this could give me a push. Also, I can share the songs I wrote years ago that still hold up in my mind today.

Windy Wednesdays will be a wind instrument feature. Right now, it will most likely feature a trumpet solo or etude. Again, I’m hoping this will be motivation for me to practice and polish a piece and deliver it to my best ability.

Freestyle Fridays will be a space for me to discuss all sorts of things. They can include the things I’ve discussed in here, like teaching strategies or musicianship strategies, or they can be something fun. I’m thinking of making one with tips for beginning chamber music players.

This is all new and in the making. I don’t expect my videos to be incredibly popular for a long while. They will be more for my own betterment.

What kinds of videos would you like to see from me?

Stephy

For the next part of the saga, click here.