WEEK 4. Quote of the day: Those who do not complain are never pitied. Jane Austen

At first, reading this, I thought, "Well then just complain!" thinking it meant that to be heard you need to complain. But then I re-read this and re-thought this and realized that it means that people will not feel sorry for you if you don't complain. If you act positive, you will get treated that way. My firm belief is to not bring my personal life into my work. And that's pretty much how I want it. I know I fell into a pity party a while back, but didn't really mean to. Just a bad day, I guess. And I'm sure people realize this, but I don't want to make it a way of life, so I am always looking for ways to keep positive and motivated toward healing. Everyone's encouragement is always welcome and much appreciated. Its not like I still don't have doubts about how this will all play out for future athletic performance, but I can only go forward and believe that it will work out.

And this was also my first full week back to work full time. I wasn't sure how this would go either, but in reality, I think I am over a hump here. I have gone from dealing day to day with never-ending pain to something that just catches up with me at times of fatigue. I'm sure this will continue for quite a while though once I get back to a more normal routine. I have basically been taking it as I feel, but have to say that the physical therapy--with the emphasis here on "physical"--has been very beneficial. Just knowing what I can do and how much to do without setting off alarms in the body has helped generally with reducing the pain. If it hurts while you are doing it, that's okay. If it continues to hurt after you are done, that's not okay. The pain meds I have taken have not really eliminated the pain, just reduced or maybe dulled it, so I suppose I will get to the point where I can take or leave those and only keep them around for as needed.

Everyone says I look good. That's encouraging, but as I said, I still don't know what they (or I) expected.

One "side effect" has been additional weight loss, which is good since I don't feel I am doing much if anything to control my weight except keeping my appetite under control and being vigilant about what I am eating. The weight loss was noticeable and commented on by everone who saw me in the early days after the accident. I think I probably looked a little frail at the time too so that may have contributed to the look. I think I look fairly normal now, and as most people say, they would never know looking at me what I had been through.

The only bad thing about the weight loss is honestly, I have NOTHING to wear, or more accurately, everything that should look good hangs. Pants are too long and with being able to wear only one style of shoe, this makes me look sloppy. Jackets that fit nicely before now seem too loose. I'm pretty sure I have gone down one pants size, which isn't all bad if, as I said, things didn't hang loosely even after buying a smaller size. I don't want to get too carried away here with buying another new wardrobe because, while I hope to not go back up in size, I suspect once the muscles return to their normal size, things will feel tighter again. Doesn't it seem odd that when you are working out the most and trying to lose some weight, it doesn't happen, yet sitting around doing not much of anything has resulted in another 4-5 pounds of weight loss! I am smart enough to know that this is probably temporary, as I said, about the muscle weight thing, but a few pounds less never hurt! And then there was my friend, Libby, who said, "Just think when you start running again and don't have to haul all that weight around." Gee, thanks, I thought losing 26 pounds on my own was pretty good!