Buttering me up

Yesterday I toyed with the idea of seeing Laurie again that night instead of waiting until Friday – with the trade show coming up and long bouts of sitting ahead of me on the flights, I wanted to be as straight as possible. So in the morning I applied one of those wraparound air-activated eight-hour heating pads that a neighbor had given me the night before. But that was far too hot, so I had to stop using it after about four hours. It burned crop circles into my back! Plus, I was a little worried because my neck kept slipping from the right position to the wrong one and back to the right one. I was afraid my head was going to roll right off my body! But it turns out it’s a good thing – it’s figuring out the right place to be, on its own.

And so my neck felt better but not quite right, and my back was much better but nowhere near right, so at 4:00 I called to see if she could take me. And she could! I arrived after treating myself to a wedge of my second favorite cheese, Jarlsberg (first favorite is Gouda) as a comfort food, and she put me into Stimu-land. She used a different bench this time… one that lowered me from a vertical mummy position to the perfect please-fix-me position, except that I had to scoot forward about a foot to put my head in the right location (what can I say? I’m short.)

Anyway, after the stimulus, she started on the massage. The machine is very powerful, and she usually does it around my shoulders and mid-back because of my neck. It can tenderize the toughest of muscles. But this time she ran it over my shoulder, mid-back, lower back (just a little) and my booty. My right side felt different than my left. So I figured the pain stemmed from the right. It turns out there is actually a muscle there! I felt it being kneaded and cajoled to relax. And so I turned to jello.

Then she told me to breathe in, breathe out, and then… Crack! CRAAAACK! Holy crap! It was amazing! (She told me that when she first saw me that was what she was working up to, but that I would have run screaming from the room if she tried it that first time. And you know something? She was right.) But we weren’t finished. She arranged me on my side in order to adjust my lower back, and that was a little awkward (like I was going to roll off the table – she warned me it would feel this way), but after a little crack, it was done. I'm almost to the maintenance phase! And I am so amazed that this is doing what it’s supposed to be doing. I also like the holistic approach of chiropractics in general.

And great news! I asked about dancing, since I really miss it and she said to try it gently, and if things didn’t go well we could figure out how best to approach it.

Plus, today Vitamin N brought me a back pillow to borrow while in the office. Yay! I’m finally feeling good!