I guess my therapist has been spending the first few sessions observing what I can do. I know that I can do a whole lot more than he has had me do so far. I haven't left one session with a drop of sweat on me yet. At my old clinic, I would leave exhausted and absolutely soaked.
I did a warm-up on the elliptical and then my therapist had me put a theraband twisted in a figure 8 around my knees. I had to walk laterally with the band on my knees up and back across the therapy floor 3 times. When I was finished, he asked me, "Where did you feel the burn?" I replied with, "What burn?" He gave me one of the easiest if not the easiest bands. My legs are weak right now from going through these surgeries, but my legs are traditionally really strong. That little weak band did nothing for me. Next, he put me on the leg press. Finally back to the leg press in therapy. I was doing that weeks ago when I was in therapy in my former city. He put a weight that he thought that I should do. It was too easy. He loaded more weight on and I did 4 x 10 reps with the band still on my knees. Again. Not that difficult. Next, I did step-ups with a foam pad on top of the step. He started me at a really low step height. I have been doing step-ups on my own and I had been doing them in therapy on a higher step before I moved. I haven't had to balance on a foam pad in a while because I don't have one of those at my apartment, so I will have to get used to that again, but again the step-ups were easy.
Next, he had me do 30 squats with a 5 second hold in the squat position for each one. I had to do these on the waffle board. I have been doing bosu squats on my own at home for weeks. Again...yawn.
The next exercise was pretty interesting because he had me strap on a waist belt that was attached to a bungee cord. I had to walk forwards against the resistance and control my walk backwards (10 times). Then I had to do the same thing for both sideways directions and also walk backwards and then forwards, all 10 times. This exercise does challenge my foot control, so I think this is good. My legs were non-plussed.
After, we went to the table and he did a short massage and then e-stim and ultrasound on my calf.
I was really happy to at least have done what I consider real therapy, but there is still much to be desired. I think the exercises are good, but we need to adjust them to make them harder for me to do, because they were all pretty easy. My therapist told me that I might be sore this weekend. In my head, I was thinking, not a chance.
When I was done with therapy, I might have had a SINGLE drop of sweat on me, but sadly not even close to enough for me to need to take a shower before going to work.
When I got back to my apartment, I changed into work clothes and went to work. This was my final prep day before class starts on Monday. I got everything on my to-do list done!
When I got home, I walked another mile!!!
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Reflection
My therapy is finally going in the right direction. I look forward to seeing what my therapist has me do the next session since he is starting to understand my abilities. This change is good.
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