I've heard of wearing your heart on your sleeve.
And I've heard of having your head up your ass.
But never have i heard of a heart in your leg.

That said, the physical therapist had my leg a-beatin.

turns out my sacroiliac joint on the right side has somehow rotated back.  aka, the bones that look like an elephant's ear has slipped backwards in a way that makes pretty much the entire lower right side of my body sear in pain.  Anyways, once you guys all stop playing your teeny tiny violins for my sad story ill get to the important part, which is, what the physical therapist did to me. Enjoy.

1. First she says, "now in order to see what's hurt, i'm going to have you do some range of motion tests which will hurt."  They hurt.  Actually, a "range of motion" test is having you stretch in one direction UNTIL it hurts.  So even if I wasn't already in pain, this probably would have sucked.  But i survived.

(i should say that my PT woman was wonderful and even though i am waxing on about the pain she caused me, she was intelligent, insightful, and overall knew what she was doing.)

2.  Heat and stimulation.  Sounds super hot right?  not so much.  First came the electrodes.  Two sets of two electrodes which stuck to my back similar to how you would hook up a car to jump-start it.  As i was making that analogy in my mind, she turned on the electricity and pretty much jump-started my leg and back.  As, and this is really informed conjecture as to what was happening, the electrodes sent a current to their mates, they made the muscles the currents were running across twitch.  And the 2 electrodes alternated, giving the impression of a heart beat (which also alternates its beats--thus the bah-dum bah-dum bah-dum sound) in my leg.  It was pretty awesome.  I was laying there, now with a warm blanket on top of the whole mechanism, thinking of funny interpretations of what was happening to me.  "I found my inner child, and he's in my leg!"  I imagined my leg pumping up like one of those old Reebok sneakers.  Growing to hulk-like proportions.  "You wouldn't like my right leg when its angry!!!"

I digress.  Big time.  Turns out the electricity stops the nerves from firing and hurting so much.  Kinda.

3. This next one was the show stopper.  After they unplugged me, she had me lay on my back with my knees bent.  I then pushed my knees out, her pushing my knees in for resistance.  After 4 of those, we did the opposite, she put her forearm between my knees and i pushed in on it.
And then i hear and feel simultaneously, "POP POP."  I was stunned.  Speechless.  Um . . . um  . . . the pops had come from my inner pelvis, one on either side of my  . . ah . . . junk (groin?).  This is not a location that i am used to feeling pops.  I would go so far as to say i am "pop averse" in that area specifically.  My PT, on the other hand, lit up.  "Did you feel the pop?" she asked.  "Two of them," I replied, tangibly less enthusiastically.  It was like her smile was a reaction to my pain.  "That was your pelvis snapping back into place," she countered.  "oh." "I  . . .  ah  . . . totally knew that."  "Feels great." "Does that mean we're done?"

4.  We are not done.  Next I lie on my back, right leg hanging off the table.  She lifts my left knee and pushes my right leg further down to the ground.  She is literally cranking my leg back into the correct place.  If it didn't feel like a dozen ninjas' throwing stars landing solidly in the small of my back, I would have hugged her.  Manually cranking the body into place is just something that i can dig, i can totally get down with that.  It makes sense.  It's old school.  It hurts a bunch.  And that was it--until tomorrow morning at 9:30am . . .

When I was a little kid, any bump or bruise to the legs was an amazing excuse to wrap an Ace bandage around the ailing limb and limp around.  And oh did i limp.  In my childhood mind there was something cool to having a limp--something rugged-- something badass.  Now 80 lb. Matt was not badass.  If your kid's glasses change color in the sun and have strings attached to them so he'll stop losing them . . . its a pretty safe bet he's not moonlighting as the bully, taking smaller kids lunch money.  A really safe bet.  And i know that on some level I was self-aware enough, even then, to realize i wasn't causing anyone nightmares.  But man could i limp.

Many years later, as a budding social scientist (still in high school however), I once walked around Tel-Aviv for an entire day with a club foot.  I was interested in what the response would be (im pretty sure no one cared, and even if they did, i didn't know much hebrew so i wouldn't have been able to understand them--like i said, i was a budding social scientist--obviously just not a very bright one).  And looking back i cringe at the idea that i was that little douche-bag who pretended to have a club foot to see how people would react.  But what can you do.  We all have to be d-bags at one point or another, i figure i could have done worse (and probably did later).

I say this because as of the last few weeks i have so damaged the musculature of my back that i once again have found myself limping.  Grown-up Matt finds this decidedly UN-badass.  I've taken some drugs and finally have seen the doctor (P.T. tomorrow) but i almost lost it today when i got in the pool and it hurt too much to swim.  That's really not good.  So i must practice patience which, if you made a list of my attributes, would be in teeny tiny lower case letters at the very bottom edge of that list. Probably last. This is also one of the reasons that the creative juices haven't been flowing blogwise.  I apologize, but in the life of any blog/blogger there will be ebbs and flows.  I promise to never flow away without warning.  Pinky promise.

And now, for your amusement:

Matt fact #44:  I really like to poke at my belly button with my thumb--shirt on or off.

I have no idea why this is comforting to me.  Ask Piaget or Freud or some other dead pscyho-analist.  For a long time, i didn't even realize i was doing it.  Finally one of my roommates in Boston pointed out that not only do i do it, on some of the t-shirts that i've had a long time (which, since i still have almost all of my high-school t-shirts, could have been one of many), there was actually a dimpling of the cotton right over the belly button area.  The fabric of the shirt had been over-stretched in that one spot to the point where it dimpled.  I know that's totally weird, but i have to say i think that this falls under "incredible cool incredibly weird things i do."  I mean, post the whole "birth" thing, what else is the belly-button good for if not to be a thumb-rest.  I telling you guys, im ahead of my time.  Bellybutton thumb-rests; they'll be all the rage someday--i mean, as it stands, people are shoving this crap through them:




I rest my case.

*editors note: for an explanation of the above jewelry, see the comments section.

Family matters have arisen.  Please forgive the infrequency of recent posts.

Moving on.

Today I got a bad massage.  Now this post is not about shaming the guy who did it (which i have no need for), but rather, I have found that getting a bad massage is the kinda thing i need to vent about in order to get over it.

Some preface.  This is all taking place at a massage school.  It only costs 30 bucks ($25+$5 tip), so results can be . . . variable.  The massages take place in two large rooms, 6 tables per room. 

All the other people getting massages got called into the rooms, I was still sitting there.  5 min later, my guy comes bounding up the stairs, apologizing and saying it'll just take a second to set up his table.  At this point I'm not feeling like my guy (whose name i never caught) has got his game face on.   He's super laid back to the point of seeming like he's not enthused about being there (which is a vibe i've never experienced from a masseuse before--quite the contrary i have found that most have had a particular jua de vive.)  He asks me if there are any particular areas that need work and I tell him that my right side (hamstring from my calf to lower back) has been really hurting (aka. immobile) and that's why im there.  he responds that he's just coming back from 3 months off.  I'm not sure why he is telling me this.  Is he lowering my expectations?  Massages are special treats to myself, and its kinda a buzzkill going into it expecting the worst.  If the secret to a good massage is communication/trust between the masseuse and the client, we are not doing well so far.

I like it rough.  I tell him this.  What i mean is that i have only once or twice experienced a masseuse giving me more pressure than i can take.  This guys early up and downs on my back feel like a mouse scurrying near my spine.  I tell him I can take much more pressure.  He adjusts.  His pressure is pretty good, but something about using that pressure totally f's his flow.  He finds a spot, pushes hard (which is good), then moves and repeats.  What I would call the "flow" of the massage, is just not there.  But he's still only on my back, and my leg is what im more concerned about.  I try to delay judgment.  I try and relax.  When he begins on my right leg I realize that this i'snt going to be the experience I hoped for.   He's going much lighter on my leg, not searching out the tightness, and generally not spending a lot of time trying to pinpoint my bad area (which is particularly surprising since the outside of my hammy is rock hard).   His touch on the bottom of my feet is so light that it tickles instead of massaging.  Next he's bending my knee.  Nope, no ending to that sentence. He just bends it.  I can touch my foot to my back, so this is . . . not even a stretch really.  He later does a similiar thing where he kinda slowly swings my arm back and forth.  It's like the light version of shaking the tension out of someone.  Again, unhelpful. 

I'm starting to tense up. I'm now going through all the negative things about the massage instead of relaxing and just enjoying.  Trying to work out my phrasing for the comment card.  Quick hint, if this kinda stuff is what's going thru your head during a massage--you aren't having a good time.  I'm realizing that getting a bad massage is very much like getting a toothy BJ.  Something that should be so relaxing and wonderful becomes a disappointing letdown.  (And you dont want to see the person again for awhile!)  He finishes my legs, but i can tell that he's done so too quickly--he's ahead of the other masseuses (who started at least 5 min before him).  Instead of going back and trying to work on my identified problem area he uncovers my back and starts pressing again.  I imagine that this is how women feels when a guy with a really small penis is giving it his all and she can't really feel it.  "this again!," i think to myself.  Any hope that this massage will get better as i flip over has evaporated.

5 minutes of the end of the massage are spent with either his hands wedged un-symmetrically under my shoulder blades or with his hands at the base of my skull  (which feels good--but i laid there forever).  I feel like he's biding time.  The "neck work" consisted of turning my head right, and then one move where he moved up my neck over and over again.  turn left--repeat.  right--repeat.  left--repeat.  This is not flow.  It was as if he was running out of ideas or moves or motivation.  He concluded before all but one of the other masseuses.  Maybe he did actually run out of ideas.  Perhaps he should have fallen back on, um . . . the shit i had told him that hurt me.  I've been to this place many many times, and this performance felt less engaged, less professional, and not super helpful.  It's not the money; it's the disappointment.  My expectation had been that my ailing back would feel better this afternoon from having gotten a massage.  No such luck.  I tried to convey this disappointment both when he asked for feedback and on the comment card.  he took it pretty well, but as I was filling out my comment card i could hear him talking about our session in the room behind me.  Unprofessional, even for a student.

Bletch bletch bletch.