Week 8, Spin 2 - uh oh ...

[gary_bart]

... numb foot ...

It's not as bad as it sounds (the numbness is entirely superficial - skin deep, in fact), but it looks like when I push things a bit, spinning, I somehow pinch a nerve. The right foot is the one that usually goes numb, but in this case it's the left one. For now, I'll carry on with going at a flat pace, and attempting to keep nice and upright (I do tend to hunch over), and see if that's OK, but I'd better start looking for yet another alternative.

Actually, if I run out of all alternatives, I'm just going to bloody well run again. Really. When I run, I know that this clears. (And the way I fixed things up afterwards today was to go for a long walk. That didn't work as well as it usually does, but I think I might have ended up in spasm if I had just gone and sat down on a car seat after the spin.)

Alternatives? One of them remains proper cycling. The seat isn't so huge, and the pedals aren't so far apart. That might help. We'll see. At the moment, spinning will still do.

It was hard going again, today, but the machine says I used up 530 Calories, so that figures. 28 minutes, which got easier somewhere in the middle, and then hard again somewhere near the end.

Enjoy your running, friends! (But first stay injury free).

[JennieHolden]

I know exactly where your coming from it's so frustrating you just know when it's going into spasm you have to be so careful but still be active. I found spinning helps me with my sciatica and it's good for strengthening your core

I'm sure you know where your comfortable zone is and not to push past that too much xx stay strong and positive

[gary_bart in reply to JennieHolden]

Thanks Jennie. So far I haven't gone into spasm, and I must be careful never to go there, I think. It does look like the steady spin is fine (but I have discovered, too, that numb feet are sneaky things it's possible to be unaware of, so maybe I'm wrong).

With me, I think it's a posture issue (at least on the most direct-cause level). My desk chair is really hard to sit in without some reaction (and touch wood, at least this has never amounted to full-blown pain). Maybe I must even put the resistance on that machine right down low, and go over to standing in the pedals the whole time, even. It would probably also help if I didn't "hold the handle bars" all the time. The only reading that requires this is the pulse, and that's something to just check when one's feeling "overtired", just to see it's not going up too high for present purposes.

I'll keep working on it. Hope your pulled tendon recovers nicely, and releases you from the dreaded couch soon.

[JennieHolden in reply to gary_bart]

Tips for spinning from my teacher are, very light grip in fact the lighter the better, keep feet flat no pointed toes, try spinning with spinning shoes rather than trainers, alter your spinning position standing sitting hover etc

My sciatica pain is due to disc 4 and 5 being slightly bulged which is trapping my piriformis sends pains into my hip and leg. I think this is why my other leg is hurting when I run as I'm over compensating

Good luck with your spinning technique

[Ullyrunner Graduate]

Did the doc ever work out what was causing it? Sorry to hear it is recurring now.

[gary_bart in reply to Ullyrunner]

He did work it out, I think, and there's not much good news for me, even though I don't suffer more than a bit of anxiety over this. (And TBH, I'm not in utter terror of the idea of even one day possibly needing wheels. I would survive that.)

The problem I have is that the lower two lumbar discs have deteriorated, so that there's not a lot of space for the nerve to emerge between the vertebrae there. This means that it's easy for the nerve to get pinched. Bad news here is that this is irreversible.

It's a bit worse than that. The MRI scan they did on me shows that one of the disks is herniated. It's developed a bulge toward the spinal cord (although down at this level this is differentiated into individual nerve bundles in the cerebrospinal fluid, so there's a bit of space in which herniations can be accommodated. It looked quite big. Apparently the herniation will partly clear by the body's inflamation processes, as long as I don't do anything to aggravate it.

(And of course the very worst news of all is that high-impact exercise like running aggravates herniation.)

The moral of the story for anyone who picks up this kind of injury? Don't hope it's just going to go away. Because some of the processes are irreversible, if you do more damage, it will be permanent. It's not to be trifled with.

[Ullyrunner Graduate in reply to gary_bart]

Oh Gary, that sounds worrying. Would swimming offer you another alternative sport - gotta keep moving somehow!

[gary_bart in reply to Ullyrunner]

Swimming is meant to be OK as far as impact goes, and I've done a bit of that. Just to cover what Jennie said about the head-up problem, I'm actually OK with that. I can swim crawl with a reasonably good style. I also have a snorkely now, so I can just keep my head down. It does dry my throat out a bit, and it's amazing how slimy the mouthpiece gets. I must be a swamp creature without knowing it.

[JennieHolden in reply to gary_bart]

Just read your reply to Ullyrunner this is the exact same as my MRI result. Be careful I know what you are going through I've had it for 4 years just keep active.

If you are going to try swimming swim with your head in the water as the pressure on your neck is immense when you swim with it out of the water

[gary_bart in reply to JennieHolden]

Thanks Jennie. Just as a matter of interest, are you running in spite of what your doctors tell you, or is their advice to run with the condition? It seems strange that the one thing that seems to help is the thing I'm meant not to do.

[JennieHolden in reply to gary_bart]

To be honest I've not checked with my Doctor the last physio I saw for 12 months said to keep active try and do something for half an hour most days which included walking. I took it that my run wasn't much faster than my walk lol xx

It did seem to be ok with my sciatica leg though so not sure if it's aggravated the other leg causing the hamstring problem

[gary_bart in reply to JennieHolden]

I got conflicting advice from the neurosurgeon I went to see. Before he saw my MRI, he was encouraging me to run; afterwards he warned me against it. Running is high impact, and aggravates the disc problem, apparently.

A dodge I think I might still try out around this is that of running barefoot. From what I've found online, it looked like there were impulses of up to 6 times body weight when running in shoes and heel striking, vs something like 2 times for barefoot running (which is basically impossible to do with heel strike). If I can mildly injure myself infrequently I'm trying to convince myself that's actually good for me. It stimulates the healing process.

I don't think I'll ever go back to regular running, but if I ran weekly or fortnightly, that might be manageable. I'd also restrain myself to going really slowly. I suppose if you're going slowly, that could help quite a lot, as long as you don't have a gait that's too bouncy?

It's a pity you didn't have a doctor who said "Run, run, run; my research shows it's the best cure". I think I might have borrowed his advice from you. In the end, we just need to be active but careful, hey? Maybe next year someone comes up with a treatment that fixes this. Maybe they'll work out a way of telling stem cells that they're disc cells, and then just inject a surplus of those into the disc? (Apparently a large part of the problem is a lack of cells to do the repair work, just about any time after early childhood).

[JennieHolden in reply to gary_bart]

Sounds like a plan I always try it and see listen to your body and if it screams nooooooo then stop I'd Deffo give it a go and see but like you say take it slow.

I always wanted to horse ride when I was a kid and eventually learnt at the grand old age of 40 which was great well until I learnt that it really aggravated my back so had to stop but at least I had a go xx

Let me know how you get on

[gary_bart in reply to JennieHolden]

I have a cousin who has been told she has to stop horse riding if she wants her back to last. Looks like she's chosen her horse over her back. You horsie people are mad.

[AvatheGardener Graduate]

Sounds awful Gary (and Jennie you naught person). My dog has spondylosis (sp?!) and it really is dreadful when he gets struck down with it. Wah!

[gary_bart in reply to AvatheGardener]

A quick google on spondylitis makes me think it's worse than what we've got. The worst case with this, if you keep tabs on it, is that they fuse the narrow discs. They take bone from the hip (I think), and build up a bridge wide enough to allow the nerves to pass through, unrestricted. No keyhole surgery possible, and lots of screws in you for a while, so it's not something you'd volunteer for, but in the then end you get to carry on walking about. Trouble is, if you have the op, the healthy discs further up will start to take strain, and they will then also degenerate.

The very worst worst case is that you end up with wheels, I suppose. Just stay calm about that, and it's not even close to the worst medical situation one can end up in.

The best case is that as part of the incredible growth in medical technology of the last few years (if you were wondering whatever happened to innovation, that's where it moved) produces a cure of some kind. We live in times where if you postpone a treatment like this, you have a real chance of having better choices available if it eventually becomes unavoidable.

[AvatheGardener Graduate]

Amazing positivity ! You could hear my house with that! 😀

[gary_bart in reply to AvatheGardener]

I'm not sure how positive it is. It's more like resignation, I think? As cheerful a resignation as possible, I hope, though. Might as well. One thing I don't intend to do is spoil today by worrying about the worst that tomorrow can bring, that's all.