Spondylolisthesis

I haven’t blogged in awhile and I apologize to the faithful few who seem to get all cranky with me when I don’t blog much. Here is a thought for you whiners:Leave comments on the blog! Most of the time I feel like I’m just writing it to let off steam or to look back when I’m old and senile and say..”Hey, I remember that!”

At any rate, I’ve been in research mode as of late. Some of you know and some of you don’t know that I suffer from various levels of back pain. Three or four years ago after an MRI was done, I was diagnosed with a Grade 1 spondylolisthesis. They told me what it was, that I could get through it with Physical Therapy at this point, and sent me on my way. I figured it was a combination of many miles of distance running and a car accident that I was in back in 1992 but it’s awful hard to determine what caused it.

Cycling never seemed to bother my back much; actually if I DIDN’T cycle my back would tighten up and hurt so I tend to make sure that I exercise regularly. As I managed to get in better and better shape I decided to take a crack at running again. Well, long story short, I did fine until I started pushing mileage higher and higher. Then….well….not so good. There went the other dream of doing a triathlon again….maybe…stupid stubborn Kevin….

Why can’t I let this die? Maybe it’s the whole upcoming event of turning 40 and wanting to get back into my *former* shape and do something that pushes my body a little further again. Yeah, I know, like riding 100+ miles on a bike isn’t pushing it enough. I just don’t think it’s meant to be. I have the Physical Therapy department at USD monitoring me and giving me suggestions. I even learned that swimming isn’t good for “spondy” which was really shocking. I thought swimming was good for EVERYTHING.

For now, I am training extra hard on the bike/stationary bike/spin bikes. If nothing else, I’m going to try to have one heck of a 40 year old time trial on the bike. Lose a little more weight and go FAST. Wish me luck!