Shouldering on. My shoulder seems to be getting better, slowly. I think it is back to where it was before I stumbled at the bottom of the stairs. And crushed part of my guitar.

That was actually the third time I have messed up my shoulder and rotator cuff.

The first time was about 30 years ago when I slipped on the same stairs. Of course, we couldn’t afford health insurance then. I went to an orthopedic surgeon and he thought it could have a slight tear. But to look any further could cost thousands. So we watched it. I did some light therapy exercises. And it did get better. I just had a lot of cracking sounds. And I gave up any plans of pitching in the majors. The shoulder stayed about the same until I fell last November trying to spread Kathy’s ashes near Lighthouse Point. It was slowly getting back to my usual level of dysfunction when I kneeled on my guitar in December.

I’ve been going to physical therapy. I think the combination of time and the doing the exercises have helped a lot. PT was a part of taking care of Kathy as she declined. We really had to work her arms and legs to keep some sort of range of motion. And to keep her circulation going. When I do the exercises at home Marty is there to help. There are two exercises where I bend over to stretch the shoulder. He sees an arm hanging down near the floor as a petting opportunity. I changed the homework diagrams.
There are two other exercises that I have to do lying down and I use a can of his dog food as a weight. He can’t figure that out at all.

At my last PT session, an older guy came in. I couldn’t help overhearing the conversations. He had diabetes and had some sort of surgical wound. He had rebandaged it with duct tape. My therapist told me there was a woman who came in after knee replacement surgery. They found out she was letting her dog lick the sutures and the wound. It was infected.

At my Huntington’s support group they got a good laugh when I mentioned taking Marty’s Meloxicam for my pain. But I really only took it a few times. I generally try to rotate any over the counter pain meds I take. One aspirin when I get up. If I need anything in the afternoon, I would take a Tylenol. And on the rare occasion that pain was bothering me, I might take an Ibuprofen at dinner time. Most of the time if I am moving and occupied or doing music things, I don’t even think about it. I guess the only problem is that my shoulder still bothers me when I play guitar. But even that is getting better.