Is not me.
I've been stressed during this lifetime - comes with the territory of being the youngest, parents divorcing when I was a wee tot, parent arguments, having to vacuum *just so* in order to get my $5 weekly allowance (ha!), a baby before marriage, two more in short order after marriage and being only 24 & 26 by the time the 3rd one arrived. The Dad has always worked hard to make ends meet - and sometimes they just didn't. I have worked off and on over the years - wanting to be a part of something other than just letting my "home world" rule me - but battling to just be "just mom" at the same time. I have not found the perfect balance. Yet. Some women would rather work from the time their newborns are 3 months old. I was never one of those, but wanted some sort of identity outside of the house too, as they got older.
So when my last "newborn" was heading into his senior year of high school - I knew I could and should leave the working world of the school district and find something year round. I was even looking forward to it. After all, while it's nice to be home in the summer - I'm not a wife/mom who has the means to join the ladies tennis club or Wednesday morning golf group. Staying home in the summer NOW, isn't what it was when the boys needed to be raced from summer camp football to summer league basketball, only to finish off two games and race to summer league baseball for a double header. I'm no longer "needed" at home during the summer. Or winter break. Or spring break.
I found a job. A job I liked. It needed to be brought up to current times, but this isn't about that. During the course of a year there - about 10 months in, I started having some pretty noticeable discomfort and pain in my lower back. I let it go for some time thinking I'd just strained it... or something. Tried a different chair at work. Paid close attention to what I was doing at the gym. My weight wasn't going up... <shrug?> It was enough towards the end of November that I made a visit to the doc. He prescribed an ultrasound (did find a small kidney stone, but not likely the problem), physical therapy, blood work, massage... you name it. Massage helped, but a few days after - I was back to sleeping with a pillow propped up behind me, in front of me and tried not to move. It. Sucked.
Within 3 weeks of me leaving said job - my back pain dissipated, until it was next to nothing. What struck me as funny - is when I told people I had left there which would spill into this "had health problems I never had before, then I left and wah lah..." - they would all say "Stress, huh?"
Okay. What?
For me, stress always showed up in the form of a migraine, which later in life turned into tension headaches - which I learned how to manage with ease. So much so, I rarely have them anymore. Oh... riiiiiightttt... that's because NOW - "stress" has chosen a *new* spot to call home.
But this was all new to me. This "back pain" stress idea. But seriously... everyone said it.
So here I am at the gym this morning - and I realize that my back feels about 98.99 % normal. I do have some little aches and pains every now and then. Like when you get a nasty gram from a college stating that $620.29 is still owed for tuition or else... and MOTY contacts that child and says: (going off topic now)
MOTY: "Have you logged on to your student page, like... recently... or EVER, this semester?"
CollegeStudent: "Oh. Huh uh. I pretty much only log on to that when I have to register for classes."
MOTY: "Hmmm. Is it almost time to register for classes? We got a nice little reminder for some unpaid tuition that we didn't know about. It's fine, but, uhhh... we'd like to know about these things - you know... sooner."
Next Day:
CollegeStudent: "Hey, I can't register for classes until my tuition is settled and I'm supposed to register - TOMORROW."
MOTY: "Mmmmm hmmmm.... "
Needless to say - that tossed a nice little amount of stress into our lives that - well, the back pain showed up for a few hours.
But back to the gym. I'm realizing as I'm working the machine I'm on what a pain back pain is, but how good I'm feeling and I'm then reminded of my days as the MRI Assistant for a local radiology clinic. Where day after day after day - the people would come in with back pain. I would interview them, get their patient history and in many cases - give them this pretty little pill to help them relax for their trip into the big machine.
The giving of the pill ticked me off. Yes the machine is loud. Yes some studies take a while, but less time if you hold still. I know - I volunteered when the new machine went in, to be a test patient for a few scans. So I understand the machine.
The majority of my patients had back pain. And the majority of them - were overweight. No. Extremely overweight. And in ALL OF THOSE CASES, they were also claustrophobic. Annnnnnd many of them... were repeat scans. So "unsympathetic me" was usually talking under my breath as I printed the films, tagged them and went to hang them for the docs. "Hey, if you'd take the time to lose some weight, your back might feel better."
Today - I stepped on the scale as I've been working out, doing different things to get back to the weight I was at from age 26-40. From 40-42 I had two surgeries and got royally screwed by the doc with an injection of hormones which took MONTHS to work through my system. One shot. Months. It's not his fault my body doesn't "process" hormones like 99% of the general population... but it's not like over the years, he didn't have time to process that kind of stuff, given my history. (Please give props to The Dad for surviving me during these long, agonizing, crappy ass months.)
Back to the scale. I stepped on it and nodded. "There you are" I said to the number that showed up. "Nice to see you again."
Which prompted me to think about weight and MY back pain. Maybe it was part stress and part weight? I've lost exactly 10 pounds since my trip to Cabo in April 2012 but it's taken more work. The older you get, the harder it seems. But worth it. 10 pounds pales in comparison to what the larger folks who entered my modality all those years ago needed to be free of. In fact, if today I still weighed what I weighed last spring, it would be considered "normal" or "healthy" for my height. Perhaps even just those 10 pounds affected me the way weight affected the patients then?
Nahhhhh... I don't think so either. Just taking a shot at being "sympathetic". Didn't work.
Oh and yes... I really did have to vacuum so that there were perfect lines on the carpet and I did only get $5 for it. For those who were wondering.
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