8 June 2010 - Progression at Last!

Greetings,

I know it has been a while since I have posted anything, well finally I have some news and some good news at that. I went to my new physiotherapist today as part of a program I have been put on in order to improve things for me. Seems that there is actually a cause for the "chest issue" that I have been having over the past months.

About a month and a half before my chest started causing some real issues I cracked a rib while fencing. Once again, my own stupid fault not parrying properly and impaling myself on my opponent's weapon. Of course that meant six weeks of pretty much no fencing at all. Only a few days after that I went to a fencing event and pretty much fenced for about six hours with very little break, not very smart, but a lot of fun.

Of course the lack of activity followed by an extensive amount of activity was bound to cause issues, and I expected that. I expected to be out of action for a couple of days after the event, I did not expect that it would have longer lasting effects. Well it seems that to compensate for the lack of activity, the joints from the sternum to the ribs tightened up along with the muscles associated, leading to the "chest issue".

So, I am off to the physiotherapist for some sessions to get the muscles and joints moving again, and thus bring back my activity level and comfort. What I am hoping is if I can convince the physiotherapist that giving me exercises pointed toward fencing would be an awesome idea. I will just have to see how it all goes. For now it is doing some exercises targeted at the particular area and working on my posture.

I am back again to the physio in the next couple of days and hopefully I will have another progress report for you all. Looks like things are finally looking up for me, which is a nice change. I am thinking with a little work, I may actually be able to progress toward some real improvements in my condition. I am not expecting to it all to "cure" me, but I am sure as hell going to do what I can to improve things for myself. If I can at least get some flexibility back and some movement I will be much happier.

Cheers,

Henry.