Hi!

stareckinickolai
stareckinickolai Posts: 1 Member
in Introduce Yourself
I'm a 38 year old male who has been on a fitness journey for the past 2 years. I used to be obese more than 10 years ago, topping out at 250lbs, lost weight and began a healthier lifestyle which included cutting out gluten (found out I had a sensitivity). Then I had a pretty bad car accident. My fitness journey came to a stand still.

I went through many years of degeneration despite trying to get better. Physio, diet changes, etc, nothing was working. I was misdiagnosed for over 5 years, started using a cane because I was in so much pain when walking but my doctor said I was over exaggerating, "you're too young for a cane", etc. I fell into acceptance before my partner at the time called bull, and I finally switched doctors. It took 3 more years of testing to find out why my hip and back were so out of whack.

3 years ago, we finally got an answer. 3 years ago I went back to my physiotherapist and got a solid plan. 2 years ago, I became cane free and started walking. 1.5 years ago I was walking 12kms per day. 1 year ago I got clearance to start back at the gym. Which brings us to December of 2023.

2 days after Christmas, I injured my shoulder. I wasn't giving my workout that attention it needed and I sprained my rhomboid. I thought a bit if TLC and I'd be back at it. I was wrong. 2 days after, I woke up in searing pain. Went to urgent care, got an ultrasound, the bursa in my shoulder were severely inflamed and irritated. I was just as irritated. Physiotherapy initiated again, but despite doing the work, it was not working. Got a cortisone shot, didn't work. So, we continued exploring.

It was a month out of the gym by this time. I was depressed eating and boredom eating, not healthy things either. I needed to get back to the gym. I gained 10lbs in one month. So, it was urgent that I find out what was wrong.

Turns out I have a number of issues with my cervical spine, along with very wonky blood work. There's still a few questions about a few symptoms that don't fit and need further testing, including a visit to a nerve specialist, but things are looking up again. The blood work deemed that I needed to do some good old fashioned blood letting (in the form of donation, because why not? Please, take my spare RBCs and put them to use!) and another strict dietary change, which is why I started on myfitnesspal. I'm as close to being pre-diabeetic without being pre-diabetic. I believe it's caused by the month of overeating unhealthy snacks and meals, and not working out at all, but I'm changing up my diet to be as sugar free as possible. It's much more difficult than I thought. I need to track everything to help. I'll be retesting in a month. If my levels are back to normal, I'll go back to my previous diet, which was pretty healthy before that month off. Maybe keep some of the changes if it works well with me. Then I'll retest again in another month and modify as needed. Fully admit that I'm a bit of a sugar fiend, so just need the extra assistance making sure I'm getting the nutrition I need without all the sugar I'm used to.

I started back at the gym a week ago, consulting one of the PTs there about modifying my workouts to accommodate my still injured right upper extremities. So far so good. Still tons of pain, but I've been through worse, this I can manage.
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