Yesterday was sunny again so I took advantage of it with my first long ride in some time. I’ve been taking it easy because I have continuing pain in my right leg. In my last post, I mentioned my Doc suspects it is SI joint pain, so I decided to see if I could get away with a longer and brisker ride as long as my position supported the SI joint well and there was no discomfort in the joint. I rode for two hours, out and back on the Coyote Creek trail. I would have gone farther, but the trail was blocked at the ford north of Bailey ave, which was flooded due to recent rains. The ride was great and I was even able to sneak in some intervals on the way back.

None of this aggravated my leg pain. This leaves me in an unusual rehab situation. Usually, when I managed to injure myself, it interferes with my training. In this case, I can train just fine with the upper body or with my main lower body activity, bicycling. But activities of daily living, involving walking or standing are impaired. Especially standing- I even have to use the little motorized carts when we go shopping. I make sure there are spare carts so no disabled person gets turned away. But it feels a bit odd to be using one.

I’ll continue riding, strength training, and stretching, plus exercises targeting the SI joint, until I see my PT on the 10th and find out if I should change anything. Today I had my lower back X-rayed and MRI’d, and I’ll be curious to see those results in a couple of days. I am fortunate enough to not be claustrophobic so MRIs don’t bother me. I even come close to falling asleep, despite the weird noises. I have a friend who is badly freaked out by them, both the confinement and the noises. She gets through it by reciting all the prayers she can remember to herself. This is actually close to meditation teacher Eknath Easwaran’s passage meditation technique. I’m going to recommend his book to her.