Relevé!

Robb in Kauai, Nov. 2005

It has been eleven months since I last went up on my toes... until last night that is. Granted, I was in four-and-a-half feet of water at the time but it sure felt good. Lisa and I had a great time swimming yesterday evening at the Berkeley High Warm Pool.

I'm always on the lookout for some clear mark of improvement in my condition. The process of recovery has been so slow that I sometimes get discouraged thinking more about what I can't do than what I can do now but couldn't before.

Last night, though, gave me the chance to note some real improvement. The last time we went swimming, back in November, I couldn't do very much. It was a good re-introduction to the water but my efforts were fatigued, tentative and weak. I thought I was in for more of the same last night. I got into the pool and immediately the water pressure set off a bout with spasticity. It felt like my legs were a big, wet towel being wrung out. I was able to release some of this tension, though, and did some walking in the shallow end. Then I realized that with the buoyancy of standing in chest high water I might be light enough to get up on my toes. It worked. Judging by a recent measure of the strength in my feet, I'd say I weigh about 50 lbs when standing in water that deep.

I had all but forgotten about the ability to rise up on my toes. (The other night I had to ask Lisa if it was possible to do this on one foot-- I honestly couldn't remember) Anyway, I was so excited by this discovery, I repeated it over and over again until I overworked my calf muscles and couldn't go on.

So... now I've got a new goal. I just need to slim down until I weigh about 45 or 50 lbs. and all my problems will be solved. Anybody have any good diet tips?

Comments

Kath said…
Rather than subtracting weight, add helium balloons! Congrats on your progress, twinkletoes!
Kathy
Team T.
Ryan said…
Yeah, make a fool of me in front of everyone using those funny little letters in the title. ;o) AQ never accounted for blogs being posted using the UTF-8 character encoding, but it's fixed now!

Another bug fixed, no idea how many more might be lurking, just under the surface.... =)
Anonymous said…
Picturing you in the Karate Kid.... doing the "stork stance" ;-D

But, seriously, Robb.... I've been reading this blog from the beginning and I can tell you (after all you dont know me from eve so i'm totally unbiased!), your a typical man... you're aging EXTREMELY well, with each picture that Lisa posts. Why do men get more hot looking with time? oh well....
leave some beefcake, so that Lisa has something to hold onto when you go dancing!! Congrats on the progress!
Anonymous said…
Okay Martha -- CONFESS!!!!

You wrote that last comment, didn't you?
Anonymous said…
In our house we deal with chronic pain in the legs ....our motto....from "Finding Nemo" is..Just keep swimming , just keep swimming, what do we do we swim swim swim. I think in your case you can kill two birds with one stone...if you keep up the therapy in the pool you will drop weight automatically... Your story is an inspiration for me thanks for all the updates!! Just keep swimming ....; )
Anonymous said…
Yes, swimming will hopefully bring two or more benefits - strength all over, weight loss, etc, etc, etc.
yee ha for progress!
x0
She in NS
knitica said…
Ok, I admit it. I just had to try to stand on one foot on my toes, because I wasn't sure if one could do that either. I only managed about a second and a half on each!

As for such extreem weight loss, have you considered bulemia? You're less hungry than with anorexia, and can still eat all the foods you love! Of course it totally wrecks your teeth...
Anonymous said…
"Keep swimming..."

That's so funny because my personal mantra for months has been "Keep moving." I was even considering having it put on a bracelet, like Lance Armstrong's "LIVESTRONG" or a dogtag like Christopher Reeve's "Go Forward."
Anonymous said…
Yeah! Robb very happy to hear your braces came. We are all thinking of you here.

Love-Lisa-sis
Anonymous said…
How are you? Love,Megan
Anonymous said…
A good diet tip that always works for me is beer and gum.

Annalisa
Troop 2440 said…
Hey I just checked out the blog this morning. I certainly wouldn't speak of your honey using the term beefcake!!

Harumph,
Martha

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