Day One Week Two Stanmore Hotel Rehab

A super busy start to the week.  After a weekend review where we discussed how we met, or didn't quite meet our weekend goals, we did a stretch class, which due to a timetable mix up we werent actually sceduled to do so we had to rush slightly through foiling a flare up and anatomy and healing before lunch,

Foiling a flare up was interesting.  We discussed what a flare was, what it wasnt (ie new symptoms which should be investigated), what can trigger them, accepting that sometimes they just happen and when they do, what we can do about it.  We are going to formulate our own flare up plans and a copy will be sent to our GP back home so we can work together with them to deal with it.  We talked about the physical and emotional aspects of flares, what makes them worse, such as pushing through, or confining ourselves to bed, and what helps, such as using pain management techniques, tens machine, heat, ice, medication, pacing and distraction.

Next was anatomy and healing.  I've always been fascinated by human biology and I found this really interesting.  We looked at what our bodies are made of, bone, ligaments, muscles, tendons etc. How they work to help us move and the processes our bodies go through when they are injured.

I had a break after lunch before I went to physio in the pool.  The plan was to spend five minutes in the water and do some floating but it was rather busy with preschool swimming lessons going on.  I got motion sickess from floating in the choppy water and I struggled to march on the spot with a noodle float so I said I'd rather just swim.  The physio agreed and I swam two lengths of the pool.  It's a pretty small pool so it wasn't that far and I got out straight away.  I felt quite weak and dizzy when I got out of the water, I sat on the edge of the pool for a while, then walked very slowly back to the changing rooms and sat down again before I got dressed.  I just about survived the experience, I wasn't as ill as I'd felt after previous swimming sessions in my local pool which was good.  We're going to try and repeat it tomorrow to see if two lengths is a reasonable baseline.  If I can continue to do that without making my pain and symptoms worse then I can think about increasing it to three lengths.

So all in all it was a very productive day!