Poked, prodded and pinned

The fine chap I visit for my acupuncture sessions has been treating me for the pain in my hip.  He's succeeded in taking the edge off the pain and I can certainly walk better without careering into shop displays and members of unsuspecting public.

No kidding, when I am in pain I walk like I'm drunk!  It's not so bad if I can stride out a bit, but if I'm walking slowly such as in the supermarket, or a really busy street the pressure builds in that hip and the pain feels like a severe stinging sensation.

Andrew at Spirit Acupuncture near Chesterfield moves heaven and earth to render me pain free and have me leave his clinic walking a straight line.  However, this is likely to be a lengthy process which is mainly due to the complexities of my issues.  After a few weeks I decided to ask him to take a different path with my sessions; one with which I could incorporate further benefits.  You see, I struggle with my weight, and I can easily change from size 14/16 to 18/20 in a short space of time.  Naturally this isn't helping the cause for my foot and hip.  I'm given to understand from other acupuncture converts that a weight loss solution combined with healthier eating is highly achievable.  So buoyed up with anticipation I consulted Andrew during which I told him about my lifelong negative relationship with food; the comfort eating, the digestive problems and my general lack of well-being.  I like my consultations with Andrew; he takes his work very seriously and is certainly a person who goes the extra mile.  And he's up for a laugh.

During the weight issue chat this week, we suddenly found ourselves chuckling at the thought of Peter Kay in his Slimming Consultant guise.  I told him about my time with Slimming World, about how much I'd lost before the despondency set in.  It's not the same for everyone.  Some people do incredibly well and manage to maintain their success.  While I had my own successes there, there were things about the group sessions that held no inspiration for me, and as a result I lapsed.

In the following clip from You Tube, Peter Kay will have you in stitches, and how he presents is of course, an exaggerated version.  But true.  Don't let that put you off if you're thinking of going though!




So after we'd stopped snorting about the loss of a pound here and there (yes it's to be celebrated!) we got on with the poking, prodding and pinning session.

While Andrew has been treating my hip, he's been concentrating on pinning my left upper arm.  He first feels for the pathway and applies a little pressure (poke!).  In most spots I don't feel anything but the pressure.  When he hits a blockage in the pathway it feels sore and that's the area he will pin.  Some places are so sore that any pressure (poke and prod!) he applies will elicit a loud expletive from me.  I apologised at first, but he assures me he's heard worse, so I just carry on swearing life a fishwife!  The feeling of soreness under pressure lasts less than a second and I never feel the pins going in.

For the weight loss, he pinned inside my outer ears, areas in my foot and I lost track of where else.  After the session I felt absolutely fine and will be going again tomorrow for 'round 2'.  We discussed a different eating regime.  No diet as such, but given some of my symptoms we both agree that cutting out dairy, bread, cereal and potatoes might be worth a try.  To take things a step further I am considering trying the Paleo eating plan.  I've already cut out the bread, cereal and spuds, and have been careful about everything else.  I've substituted cow's milk for Almond milk, but I confess to having a preference for Hazelnut milk as it's nicer in coffee.

 I thought I'd succeeded in keeping it fairly gluten free. That is until I read a small amount of dark chocolate such as 70% cocoa solids is OK to have.  At work we have a Costa coffee outlet and there I found a bar of Divine dark chocolate  labelled at 70%.

Feeling a choc feast coming on I took it to my office and checked the label.  Along with the good stuff, it contained (note past tense!) milk and gluten.  Not good news but I got stuck in anyway.  I have to say, it's no substitute for Cadbury's chocolate but a couple of squares of Divine satisfied the choc craving.  Truly, I really didn't want any more.

So watch this space and I'll be letting you know my ups and downs in all this.  If there are any gory details I'll spare you those!

Attention Deficit Cleaning Disorder

Yep this just about sums me up.  However, I end up 'doing' a lot of work.  Interesting word, dong.
Did you spot it?

Early menopause and Electric Shocks!

In effect, at 63 I've outgrown the menopause.  Mine began at the age of 39 with some mild symptoms such as a fuzzy head, grumpiness and a change in my flows together with different levels of pain.  I had no idea what was happening and neither had the GP.  "You're far too young to be starting the menopause" he tried to reassure me.  "But tell me about your mother.  What age did she begin hers?  It may have some bearing".

I cried then, with grief and frustration.  This was just another question about my genetics that I couldn't answer.  You see my mum died at the age of 58 when I was 28 with a young baby.  As neither of us had foreseen her premature death, we hadn't talked about menopausal stuff like that.   There should have been plenty of time for a natural progression into such conversations, and at that time she was just thrilled to be a grandmother.

I'll talk about mum in a separate post.  She deserves one of her own.

So, no knowledge of the female family history of the menopause meant I was out on a limb.  The doctor was so convinced nothing was happening with my hormones he didn't see it necessary to send me for a blood test.  Despite my tears, he sent me off and suggested I come back if I noticed further changes in my periods.

Not to be outdone, I left it a few weeks, went back and saw a different GP.  A lady this time.  She too, was sure it wasn't menopause but did agree to a blood test.  It came back showing I was in the early stages.  She called it perimenopause.

We talked through a general list of symptoms and I confirmed I had at least 10 of those including bloating, weight gain, rather disturbing memory lapses and irregular periods.  The positive thing that came out of it was at the ripe young age of 48 it was all done and dusted!

Carol E Wyer has published a great book titled Grumpy Old Menopause.  Here's a synopsis from the Safket, the publisher's website -

Grumpy Old Menopause
To be administered in one large dose for maximum effect

Have you started to write post-it notes with your kids' names on them? Do you need to change your underwear after every sneeze? Guess it's time to read this book then. It'll help you get through "that" time in your life with a spring in your step and a smile on your face.
With numerous suggestions, sensible advice and amusing anecdotes, Grumpy Old Menopause will help you sail through that tricky part of a woman's life with ease and humour. It should prevent you from turning into Mrs Crabby or worse still, a demonic monster.

"An excellent mix of humour and sound advice. This book is a must-read for all women ... I highly recommend Grumpy Old Menopause. It is the perfect blend of humour and excellent advice to help all women sail through the menopause." - Nicky Snazell, Fi STOP Consultant Physiotherapist in Spinal Pain, Fellow of Institute for the Study and Treatment of Pain. International Lecturer in Pain and Health.

I enjoyed reading Carol's book for not only it's humour, but her empathy together with hints and tips about how to cope. 

Electric Shocks
Carol touched on an area of the menopause that doesn't often get recognised or spoken about.  Electric shocks, folks.  Not the kind that you get when you touch bare wires - well come on, you just wouldn't.  Would you??  No?  Good lass!  The electric shocks she refers to are of the hormonal kind.

I have very vivid memories of my own personal experience with them and they seem to baffle everyone including the GP.  (Do I have duff GP's at my practice?  Seems like it upon reflection!) 
Anyway, I'm digressing again - let's get back on track.  About 5 years into the menopause, I found myself one day getting jabbing pains on the top of my head, just to one side.  They lasted a matter of seconds but were so intense they upset my vision a little.  A short while later on the same day, I had a massive stabbing sensation in my upper left arm, quickly followed by a similar feeling in my abdomen.  I was worried enough to chuck a sickie from work that day and hurtled straight round to the GP's thinking I was having a stroke or something!  He told me I was suffering from stress and wrote me a sick note for 2 weeks off work.  I don't recall that I was particularly stressed, at least no more than usual, but hey, who was I to argue about having a fortnight off? 

However, the pains continued sporadically, always with some intensity and I found that I was also getting them at my cervix, in the roof of my mouth and in my tongue as well!  A further visit to the GP to get the new pains checked out resulted in him telling me to change my job as it was obviously stressing me out.  I'm glad I ignored that piece of advice as I liked my job.  My colleagues were wonderful, if a little baffled themselves about my bizarre symptoms.   One lady in particular said to me that daft as it seems, this could be hormonal.  I thanked her and followed up her suggestion.  Sure enough, a little research unearthed a website that indicated all my symptoms as hormonal electric shocks! 

It was such a relief that someone, somewhere had written about it and I felt reassured that the pains would eventually  run their course, along with most of the other menopause symptoms.  I apologise here as I have lost sight of that website, but here's one for you to consult if you wish to read in more detail.

For anyone out there who is suffering from these shocks, I hope the writing of my own experience helps to reassure you.

Music - a great painkiller. Slash and Beth Hart "Whole Lotta Love"

This will not be to everyone's taste of course,  even with my love of gentler music, there's this need for the heavy and gritty stuff.  When I stopped smoking 12 years ago, it was listening to heavy rock that helped me to succeed.  For example, in the car, playing at full thrutch Black Sabbath or Led Zeppelin deadened my senses to the point where I forgot I wanted a fag!

I discovered Beth Hart when she did collaborations with another of my favourite rock and blues guys, Joe Bonamassa. Such is the power of her voice and indeed the power of her appearance too, she can soon make me forget the old aches and pains.

This team up with Slash for the great Led Zep song had the purists pouring out of the woodwork screeching their criticisms.  I know nothing compares to Robert Plant and Jimmy Page getting off on it, but I like the Beth and Slash version a lot.

Music is a great therapy!

Hello Sunday!

I really need to get off me bum and get some stuff done. BUT, Mr Grumpytrousers is out for an hour or two and the peace is rather pleasant I have to say.

How shall I use that time? Clean the bathroom (it really does need doing). Nah, stuff that. Hoover the bedroom? Well, that means disturbing the cat so maybe not. Candy Crush then! Nope, gone off that...been stuck on Level 94 for a week and now officially bored.

OK, I think I'll download some music into my 'Feelgood' folder on the laptop. That's always a nice thing to do while no-one's in. I can't get moaned at then.

This is what's going in my folder....

**********

I wrote the above around 10.30am and its now 2.30pm.  While the music was downloading I decided to go for a walk to the newsagents at the other end of the village.  My lovely follower, author Carole E Wyer hinted that 'someone we know' was on page 27 of this weeks Take a Break. I enjoy reading anything that Carol writes, and can highly recommend her as a good read.  So, incentive enough to get bundled up in my winter jacket, strap up my foot and get my trainers on.  It's still sunny as I write and I have to say my waddle up to the shop was lovely.  Being out in the fresh air, feeling the wind ruffling my hair and whipping hell out of my skin, but all was good.  For a while.

As I set off I almost skipped down my road as the strapping on my foot was holding it nicely in place.  The pain was minimal and I figured I'd make the 1 mile round walk with no bother.  Hmm, how wrong could I be?  I made it to the crossing when I felt my hip starting to hurt.  "It'll go off" I thought as I trundled along past the playing fields.  The sun was behind me at this point and I noticed my shadow.  If I didn't know differently, I'd have said that shadow belonged to someone else.  Some decrepit old biddy who walked like she'd got one leg shorter than the other!  I monitored my walk all the way.  If I stopped for a moment 'to take in the view' (a rest stop if you must know), the pain subsided a little and I could set off pain free and walking almost normally.  However, it took less than 30 seconds for the little fecker to kick in which meant my stops became more frequent as I neared the shop.  I wished for someone to come along who I knew so I could stop (and rest) for a minute or two to say hello and have a quick catch up.  That didn't happen today, so I had to rely on loitering on the edge of the pavement waiting for traffic to pass. 

Strangely in all of this, my foot didn't give me any grief.  It was all hip related.  I shall be explaining all of this to the consultant when I see him on the 21st of this month.  I had an assessment with a sports massage lady at work who suggested that my hip problem may not be in the joint.  She feels it might well be something divinely named Tensor Fasciia Latae (nothing to do with Fascias and Soffits.  And definitely not Starbucks related either).  It's something that runs from the hip down the outside of the thigh and stops by the knee.  It's been impacted by the way I walk which directly stems from my foot.  My gait is so uneven that I feel unable to stride out with my right leg.

Right I've done moaning now.  The grumps are gone.  Husband still not back so a bit more free time for the moment.  Maybe I ought to show the bathroom a cloth and some spray bleach.  Or shall I go wave a duster round the bedroom?  Oh, the cat's still in there though.  I won't disturb her.



 Happy Sunday!!!!!