Injury Time Out

I'd been feeling good about exercising and spacing out my work-outs, so I was blindsided on Labor Day when my body told me otherwise. I started to do push ups and felt pain behind my elbows. It wasn't the dull ache like post workout and it wasn't a stinging sharp pain like a tear or immediate injury. But it was a signal. I went ahead and went through with my workout albeit a little lighter. I wanted to see if it went away as my body warmed up, but it didn't.

I pulled out my Google MD and made a diagnosis: Triceps tendonitis. 

So I pulled the plug on exercising. 

Honestly, I should have continued with the running and leg workouts, but I decided my body was telling me to take a break. I like being fit, but it's more important for me to be healthy and uninjured to deal with work, barn, and family. 

And now it's been three weeks as I write this. My triceps feel fine. There were some minor aches and twinges the first week when moving hay bales and the like, but I think they've been fine since the two week mark passed.

I haven't got back to exercising yet, though. Partly that's due to my left arm. I think I have Golfer's Elbow from the tests/etc I looked up online. My guess is that in addition to the normal strain from exercising, I've had bad form and tended to curl my left wrist when doing bicep curls. I get small flashes of pain and tenderness around the bump on my inner elbow. The pain is minor and doesn't affect me save I know it shouldn't be there. And while it's nothing concerning now, I don't want to push it too soon and grow it into something worse.

So the habit I started in April has come to a full stop. 

If the left elbow pain doesn't heal, I may need to check in with a doctor. I've avoided doing so before now, because I presume the first piece of advice will be "rest it and avoid overusing it." If I show up over a month later saying, "Yeah, I did," I can save a copay and skip to whatever is next (Hopefully not "Let's spend some money and really look at it!")

I probably should start running and working out unaffected muscle groups again.

On the plus side, the energy and time I saved let me play some Civ 6 and get back to writing! I've made a lot of progress since I started playing catch up (This is the 23rd post within 5 days of starting up again).