Think of male gymnasts, and how they have to contort and elevate themselves on this thing. Now remove the twisting and contorting, and you have what I had to walk through to complete a series of simple exercises. As I held on to both sides, I worked on coordination and muscle memory by raising alternating legs to a plastic chair. Easy enough, right? Then my therapist, an Indian guy whose name I forget five seconds after it's uttered, let me rest.
This isn't so bad, I thought. Then I fumbled through a batch of exercises that reminded me of how fucked-up my muscles really are. It's hard to ascertain how much of this has to do with MS, and how much can be attributed to the weeks of idleness that my muscles had to, literally, sit through while I lay in the hospital bed. First was an exercise whereby I had to reach, and touch with my toes, for complementary ends of a half-circle made of black tape on the floor. I get distracted easily, and I couldn't help but think that I was reaching for a large protractor. One of those half-ones that come in zippered plastic packages of school supplies. Do they even still have those? Anyway, this was more difficult than I anticipated. My body kept veering off to one side, so I had to clutch my trainer's arm. Then he waved me over to a table, and I breathed a sigh of relief because this meant I could sit.
As I lay flat on my back, I had to thrust my pelvis up and hold that position for five seconds, then lower it back down. I'm good at this, so infer from that what your sick mind will. Then I flipped over and propped myself up by my knees and hands before I stretched out one arm and kicked back the opposite leg. Both extremities would be held aloft for five seconds, and then I would switch sides. I was all right at this, but the narrow table bothered me. I felt like I could fall off either side. Luckily, I didn't, but this unease stayed with me for the next round of exercises. I sat up and faced the opposite wall, and stood up and then sat back down slowly. My trainer has a thing about inhibiting your vision, and he wanted me to do this without looking down (or holding the table for balance). He told me to keep my eyes on a fixed point on the wall.
These exercises are all pretty simple, but I was shocked to feel sweat rolling down my face. Again, I was reminded of how inactive I had been during the hospitalization, and how this idleness had eaten away my muscles. Whenever I'm examined, doctors, and even this therapist, have expressed shock at how strong my muscles are. Yeah yeah, I always think dismissively, and rightly so. The muscles themselves may be strong, but they do not move with ease and grace. Instead, they plod and plop. I struggle to control them, and the stream of sweat conveyed this. Luckily, the trainer noticed, which I'm sure is especially hard to do since I don't breathe with an open mouth, and assured me that I was almost done.
The last exercise was a basic standing push-up against a wall. I think mostly this was supposed to be a stretch, but at this point everything was an exercise.
What I gleaned from the hour was that the strength is there, but I have to learn to ignore any internal monologues of warning or hesitation. I can do these exercises, but my brain keeps getting in the way of their full completion. Don't get me wrong--I still complete them, but I have to silence my own caveats. I feel like a schizophrenic sometimes as I quash voices inside my head before I set out to complete simple tasks.
They get done, and afterward the effort is only an afterthought. The problem is with forethought. I must extinguish doubt before it has a chance to infiltrate my psyche, and subsequently doom whatever it is I want to do.
I detest it whenever someone quotes the Bible, and in this case it's maddening to think of that oft-quoted verse in Matthew: "the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak." I have to go Zen when doing certain things. Unfortunately, I can't stop objecting to the inaccuracy, or at least incompleteness, of phrases like this.
In my case, the flesh is willing, but the mind gets in the way.
R
