Getting Old=No Fun

Well, that's not entirely true. Maturing is a lot of fun. The self-esteem, wisdom (if I can be so bold as to claim I got some of dat), experience, not to mention being a much better cook than when I was a newlywed-that's all good stuff. Where maturity is concerned, I am always glad to move forward.

However, my body is falling apart. When you are young, you take for granted being able to push yourself with no consequences. I cannot imagine what kind of freak-of-nature I was to be able to pull all-night study (or ahem, party) sessions in my late teens, early twenties. The thought of it makes me tired. Or how quickly I bounced back from new baby all-nighters. When my oldest was 6 weeks old (and I was 20), she became very ill with two ear infections and pneumonia. She wouldn't sleep, just cry. Everyday I brought her to the doctor, and they sent me home saying I was overreacting until she needed to be hospitalised. Anyway, I was up with her for like 4 days straight. No way I could do that today, at least not without the people around me being able to live with me. But then again, today, I would not be up that many days straight because I would have raised some serious hell if they tried to tell me I was imagining my baby was as sick as she was. Sadly, that was my first initiation into the hard lesson that doctors don't know everything.

I digress. I did something to my knee. This was an entry simply to whine about it. Boo hoo, my knee hurts. I think I have jumper's knee which annoys me. When you are so busy, and everyone is counting on you to get so much done,every small bump in the road is truly debilitating. You cannot skip dinner one night without planning ahead financially. McDonald's for eight might just truly cut into the budget. I am having trouble going up and down steps, so the laundry is on a delay.Everytime I put weight on my knee, besides the pain, it gives out on me. I almost fell down the basement steps twice yesterday. The kids help out with that of course, but their schedule is not the same as my OCD one. If I don't have three loads done by 10 AM, I start doing that thing where I leave a load in the dryer, or fold them up and leave them in piles on the back of the couch. I hate that. Do you know how many socks I have lost to the Couch Cushions of Narnia?

I mean what the heck? I never injured so easily at 22. Actually, not totally true come to think of it. I spent a lot of time hobbling around on crutches from ankle sprains, but again, I knew I wasn't following the "no injury" rules, such as pathetic warm-ups. I was just 22 and I bounced back quick. And it was not as big a deal. Laundry could be put off a day. With a toddler and a baby, dinner could be grilled cheese and some raw broccoli with ranch dressing, with no one whining about hunger pains. Now I am super-careful about my form and "the rules", and here I am. No fair!

I have an appointment on Monday afternoon, and I am hoping with ice and wraps the problem resolves itself by then. From what I read, if this is patella tendonosis, I've been walking around with the Stage 1 kind for a couple if years now and have been ignoring it because the symptoms are so minor. Now I did a good job and have upgraded to Stage 4 which might mean no working out for a few months. I hope I don't gain another 50 pounds from lack of working out. Since I hit 30, (or since I had number five, not sure which because struggling with weight loss has been an issue since then) this has been exactly what getting back into shape has been like:

I have no desire ever to buy Slim Quick, but this commercial is a gem.