On the DL

I am injured. I have been ignoring the pain and discomfort for a few weeks and, surprise surprise, it is not going away. In fact, it's getting worse every day. Now I have to do something about it. Arrgh.

The injury is to my shoulder, or arm, or perhaps even my neck. The pain is in my upper left arm, maybe above the bicep, but it hurts whenever I rotate my shoulder. Guess what? I rotate my shoulder a lot. Putting a purse on my arm, putting a shirt or jacket on, reaching to close the car door, and dozens of other activities are all extremely painful. I am completely left handed so everything is done with that side.

For some reason the pain does not increase when I lift Maggie but I know that lifting her is exacerbating the problem. She weighs 66 lbs and I have to lift her dozens of time every day. In addition I have to reposition her in the wheelchair a lot and those movement are particularly difficult. Thats not going to stop, though, so I have to factor that in to the recovery.
As I sit here there is a dull pain in my shoulder and arm, but if I move into a certain position and I'm not sure exactly what it is until it happens the muscles start spasming and the pain is excruciating. That happened in the middle of the night last night and I scared the bejeebers out of my husband when I started yelling.

So today I have to find a doctor to deal with this. Ironically, my sister the nurse, works for a shoulder specialist. She is encouraging me to go up to Santa Rosa to see him, but I just don?t think that's practical. It's tempting because I know I will get attentive care, but it?s over an hour each way and who knows how often I'd have to go. I just cannot be so far away and take so much time when I can find someone locally.

Whatever I do, I have to do it soon. I cannot be on the disabled list. I am central to the team.