When The Mind Is Over The Matter

I have been suffering for about a year with problems in my right shoulder. I went to a massage therapist. She was amazing, and used pressure points to take away a ton of pain. She helped me to be able to lift my right arm without pain,...well, to the front, anyway, even though the side lift is still painful.

I went to the doctor finally, about 6 months ago, and they told me that it was a "frozen shoulder". They told me to go to a physical therapist and work on it to get it working properly again.

Ok. But I put it off and really didn't believe what they said.

I continued to go to the massage therapist, and worked on little exercises to help strengthen it. Heal thyself, anyone?

It seemed to get better by the beginning of summer, so I didn't worry much about it. I figured that it was on the mend and the 6 months....or...er....9 months that it would take for the "frozen shoulder" to mend was about up.

Well, then I started using it a lot again. That is the problem with these bodies that we have, we have to keep using them. So annoying.

I started doing my band gigs and as usual, the adrenalin gets going and I get wild and take my tambourine to new heights, and end up the next day with a ton of pain!

That is what happened, over the summer, in a nutshell.

So, this week the pain was unbearable. Even Ibuprofen wasn't working. (And now I get to reveal to the world that I take AT LEAST 4 of those beauties to numb me----sometimes 5----uh, oh----an addict, huh?)

My husband made a call to a doctor in our church---an ortheopedic surgeon. He had asked me to come see him months ago, but....well,....I thought that I could handle it. We don't really have any insurance right now, but that's another story, so this doctor deserves a medal for even seeing me.

I hate doctors, by the way. It goes way back to when I had rheumatic fever as a child. But that's another story.

So, after the doctor did some preliminary strength tests----hold your arms up this way, push up with your arms, keep your thumbs pointed down, etc. and he determined that yes, something was wrong with my right side, he ordered x-rays.

Well, I imagine you are guessing what was found. I had something that started with a "T",----that's what my cutie son says, since I always forget what it is.... Oh yeah, it was Tendonitis in the rotator. Sounds familiar, right? Thats what I have, and the doctor pronounced it "good", because there was something that he could do.

That something was having a shot of cortisone to the area. Now, I don't know about you, but cortisone sounds like something that is SERIOUS! My old mom-in-law used to have shots of it and her skin became like paper!

But, the doctor assured me that this was for the best, and since I used this particular muscle so much, and couldn't really let it rest too much, that this was my best bet. Ok, ok, so he convinced me.

Well, the doctor himself gave me the shot. I have a thing about shots also----right----you got it, that same rheumatic fever memory, but I tried to be a "big girl" about it, because my son was watching... (It would be a bit embarrassing to start to cry and blubber about shots in front of him.)

Don't you hate it how they say, "You'll feel a pinch"....

What? You mean, some pain? OOOwwww, I hate them!

Fast forward to the next day----I was still a bit sore.... But I had a gig to do that night, and I knew that I had to get it together. So, I took my ibuprofen and soldiered on...

I have tried to look at the whole situation as "mind over matter", which is what I suppose will start to be an everyday occurrence as one ages. You know, aches here and there, and you just have to keep on, no matter what you feel like.

Well, yesterday morning, I awoke to find that my right shoulder felt great! No pain, no strain----amazing!

The only problem is that now I have noticed that my left shoulder is hurting. I believe that I hadn't really noticed it, because my right shoulder was so much worse.
So, I have to decide what to do.

Any suggestions?