What a drag it is getting old

We were in Chicago last week for Thanksgiving.  If I had a normal life, we could have stayed at my mom's house.  But her crapshack is in seriously bad shape so a pricy West Loop hotel room it was.  It's strange how the West Loop is so neighborhoody now when it once was factories and warehouses back in the day. Next time we will have to find a more cost-effective option, especially if I don't find steady work.

Speaking of, the new gig did not work out.  Not only was it a shitshow but they didn't have enough work for me.  Their leadership was also lacking clarity and direction.  They didn't even have the decency to tell me things were not working out.  I found out because I saw a post for my role, slightly watered down and for less money.  I showed it to the recruiter and he was blindsided as well.

I got paid for 301 hours at $83/hr which was enough to pay for getting our deck stained and sealed and perhaps the new garage door we needed.

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Four or Five Sundays ago (Nov 6), I woke up with a sharp, stabbing pain in my right shoulder blade. I didn’t do anything strenuous the days before so I’m assuming I slept on it funny. The pain didn’t go away and antiinflammatories did very little the first few days though they are helping now. Each day it did diminish slightly and shift; one day in my arm, the next day shoulder, the next day shoulder blade, etc.

Some advice my friends at NancyNall shared

"Icarus, there are 4 muscles that are involved in the rotator cuff which allows you to move your arms at the shoulder and keeps your shoulder in its socket. I learned all this last year when I blew out my bicep and also had shoulder issues, and went to physical therapy. The muscles do the following (from the internet): Supraspinatus controls internal rotation and lifting of the arm. Infraspinatus allows you to externally rotate your arm in the shoulder socket. Teres minor is a small muscle that helps rotate your arm. Subscapularis controls arm abduction (holding your arm out straight, away from your body.

The Subscapularis is behind your shoulder blade and curls up over the shoulder. That turned out partly to be the cause of my problems. The physical therapy I did were exercises with rubbery bands and lots of deep massage in the area which was painful while it was happening but helpful overall. I had to hold my elbow up in an awkward position when I was prone facedown so that my shoulder blade stuck up straight and they massaged deep behind it. It helped."  Deborah

Icarus, my husband had polymyalgia rheumatica which began in the shoulders and was oh so painful. His rheumatologist treated him with prednisone over two years weaning him from 40 mg to 0 very gradually. It is problematic for folks with Northern European genetics and he is German to the bone. SED rate was high, which helped diagnosis. No fun.  -Deni Menken

"Icarus, I once woke up with severe shoulder pain and found out that it was cervical radiculopathy. It was coming from a pinched nerve in my neck and had nothing to do with the shoulder at all. I had some steroid injections into the spine and physical therapy and things pretty much came back to normal. That was about 12 or more years ago. Alex