I have not posted for a while because typing hurts my shoulder.

the ortho dr took xrays of my neck and shoulder. I have an arthritic joint in my neck causing my hand numbness. I have a congenital condition in my shoulder called type ii acromioin, meaning the bones at the top of my rotator cuff curve down and can rub the tendon. The dr thinks I just have tendonitis at this point and sent me to a PT for therapy. That is going so-so (slow recovery). I hope I’ll be able to swim 750m by May 7th, my first race. If not, I plan on doing the race anyway, just swimming one arm or whatever I can manage. This is such a bummer because I was really feeling like I had a good swimming groove going. Now, I haven’t been able to swim in 5 weeks and am losing muscle mass in my arms and losing endurance in swimming!

I have been doing hard kick workouts at swim practice, hoping to improve my kicking to make up for my lack of arm strength. This week my IT bands have been very tight and I have had knee pain and sore hips after swimming. I never knew swimming could cause so much pain, and it’s supposedly the “safe sport”.

LESSON: just because you think swimming is the “safe sport”, doesn’t mean you can keep pushing your body to do longer and more intense sets without following the 10% rule. Also, stretching is important for swimming (not just running and biking as I thought). I was not stretching after my swim workouts.