One of the things that I think every orthopedic patient deals with at some time is physical therapy. I hate it, I admit. In large part I hate it because I hate exercise. I have ALWAYS hated exercise. I have seldom ever done it, but when I did I hated it.

As a kid, we had these crappy exercises;. I swear to god, I had to do sit-ups for JFK – there was some program out of Washington to make all of us physically fit specimens. What a joke. Gym. What a joke. I hated most gym activities, hated running around, hated team crap. It was a horrid way to teach kids about “popularity” and how screwed you are if you wear glasses or aren't coordinated or competitive or just don't LIKE playing games and the nasty stuff about choosing sides and the power that athletic kids had over the rest of us began early and stuck around. It still exists of course- just read up on how much money is poured into high school and college athletics – mainly football; and if you think Title Nine changed things, it did. Somewhat. But never enough.

Over the years, I’ve been sent to PT several times.
It tends to be a waste of time and effort.

It was a waste of time, I know, because they told me so. I never complained, I did everything I was told – I really did – right up until the therapist in each case said to me “this isn’t doing any good is it?” No, I replied, it’s not. We agreed there was no change and they’d say “do you want to keep coming?” Huh? No, I think not. It’s BORING, it’s not helping and I really can find LOTS better stuff to do, thanks.

I also came to realize that they often had no freaking IDEA what to do for me. They made it up as they went along. This, I found very dismaying. It told me that they weren’t sure how to help me. It also told me that I was in some ways being lied to. PT is always presented (at least in my experiences) as an absolute fix. This is will if you just do what you’re told.

They found me a challenge, a puzzle, not easy to fix. I learned this basically when I overheard two therapists trying to figure out what to do, what might work since nothing WAS working, even though apparently it usually did. Again, this had been presented to me a solid “do this and you will get better”. In fact, they had no idea, and were, experimenting on me, maybe doing things that would make it worse. Who knew? I didn’t like that. I don’t like being experimented on. I prefer honesty.

Also, with PT and with orthopedic problems, there can be a mind set. I’ve had doctors get angry because I said something had worked and then had to take it back as it stopped working. I’ve had conversations with dozens of women told that there was no problem with their backs, that they were hysterical, attention-seeking, too high strung, emotional, suffering from empty nest syndrome or god knows what. Patients who don’t get better are often blamed for not doing their exercises or somehow just failing. It isn’t the doctor’s fault. This is not very common any more – doctors are far freer to say “I don’t know” or “I’m sorry, I can’t fix that” than they used to be. But somehow there is still a mentality of “you have to WORK to get better.” If you aren’t, it’s YOUR fault. If you continue to complain after the doctor has done everything he knows how to do, you’re sabotaging things and you’re a mental case. I've found reasonable doctors early on who did not buy into that.

My masseuse Jean, who has treated me for over 12 years, says she has encountered a similar mindset in offering massage to people who could benefit from it. She used to work in medical offices. Even there, massage is somehow suspect because it feels good. PT doesn’t feel good. Massage is passive. Exercises mean you’re WORKING so it has to succeed. If you’re just lying there, well, you’re not WORKING. And somehow it seems you have to experience more pain to improve. That “no pain no gain bullshit” has infected too many minds. Massage DOES help me but I can’t afford it all that often.

So, I’m doing PT again. When I saw the new doctor some weeks ago, she truly thought it would work on the shoulder I’ve been screeching about. And guess what. No shit, it seems to be helping. Early on, something – well I want to say “snapped” though we heard nothing, but suddenly the worst of the vicious nasty pain that used to wake me was gone. G-O-N-E. After weeks and weeks. There’s lots left though, and as my therapist says, “it’s broke, it can’t be fixed”. So we’re working around it. And so far I’ve gotten some reach back and some range of motion stuff has improved. However it still hurts on a daily basis and will continue to pretty much for all time. BUT, I am trying seriously to do the exercises at home and honestly assess how they feel. And to ice the thing twice a day. I went out this past week and bought hand weights because one thing I CAN do with no pain is build up some arm muscle which might be able to do the job that other stuff can no longer do.

So there you have it. MY experiences with PT. You got any?

Oh, by the way, did I mention Stu and Idid go see the “Hairspray” movie? It’s huge fun. Although the best line of the movie, was actually not IN the movie, but in an interview about the movie. Never in my life would I have expected to hear actor Christopher Walken say “I play John Travolta’s husband”.

And Allison Janney has a small part.