“From what I’m reading here, it could be rheumatoid arthritis or fibromyalgia, neither of which appear to be much fun for you.” The Fabulous Feathermaye told me this as I came back inside the office with her this morning. I had been out dust mopping the hallways of our storage property, about a mile walk once done and I’m usually good and warmed up by that time. I grunted and groaned and took my chair.
For the last couple of months, the pain in my joints (shoulders and hips) has been escalating daily, leaving me miserable by evening and waking up around 3 am when I try to turn over in my sleep and it feels like I’ve impaled myself on a sharp, cold spear tip. Yikes! WTF?
Pain from the past is conditional for ex-football players. I read everyday about other old men who crunched themselves a time or two too many, and are paying for it as they succumb to age.
You know it’s going to be a helluva conversation when your wife asks you: “Do you have any pain in your soft tissues?” I indicated that no, it’s the joints, like hot metal shavings have been tossed in there and the ball-tipped bones are grinding down as I move. “Well, that rules out fibromyalgia then…” She continues. Her mouth turned ever so slightly into that mask of worry she takes on when I’m falling apart. I don’t blame her; it can’t be easy to watch anyone fall apart.
The shoulders. How many times have I jammed them into another human being? Every now and then, I might miss-time the hit and the collision catches me off guard. You walk away from those with your arm hanging uselessly at your side, waiting for it to come back to life so you can do something different on the next play. Such is life when you think you’re invincible—and 50 years old seems a long, long way away.
The hips though… I hadn’t expected problems there. That old commercial keeps haunting me when I think about it: “I’ve fallen and I can’t get up!” God help me, am I doomed to wear a Med-Alert button around my neck? Is that commercial still on? Do they still make those things? Or, did they go out with the clapper? Maybe they only advertise those damn things around Christmas time…
Our day job isn’t that hard, by any stretch. I’ve enjoyed it because of the exercise I get daily. Of course, winter slows down that a bit. This March I started to feel the joint pain after I’d been lazy for about three weeks. I figured it was just age, time catching up with me and a little stretching, a little ‘getting back in shape’ was all that was in order.
Feathermaye and I ordered ‘Sketchers’ walking shoes and that’s when I really noticed the pain. Not that the shoes caused me to hurt, they just exposed the places where I now realize, after weeks of trying to just ‘work through it’ that there is a problem. We have agreed, for now, to go straight to the Doc when we get back from this trip back East.
In Part Two of this painful expose, I’ll let you in on just what the Doc has to say about it. Meanwhile, I’ll just continue to walk it off.
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