Last night was bad. I went to bed without taking any pain medication, which would be fine at this point, except for Cursed Neck™. Any time I lay on my back (the only way I can really sleep right now) the lower left part of my neck starts to hurt like [long string of expletives here]. This happened last night and for multiple hours I just laid there, hoping that maybe my body would exhaust itself and shutdown or something.
Instead, I took a Tylenol and a Hydromorphone pill (the opioid that came with the sheet warning of ADDICTION and DEATH) and had Jeff warm up the old neck beanbag thing, which is basically a long cloth tube full of beans that can get toasted up in the microwave. I wore this around the back of my neck, helping to relieve the pain, while also serving as a makeshift brace that elevated the neck.
It was getting close to 3 a.m. but it worked, and I actually slept decently for the next six or so hours. I’ll be using the beanbag again tonight, but at regular bedtime.
Meanwhile, I broke my admittedly short new 10,000-step streak yesterday, because I felt worn out. Today, I wanted to get some actual exercise and walked to Burnaby Lake and back. It went fine! The only time I felt myself straining was coming up from Lower to Upper Hume Park, which I did in one go. I was a little winded at the top.
I have 15,411 steps as I type this, the most since the surgery, so woo for that.
Here’s hoping the next week is all about improvements and feeling peppier.
A few photos from my walk, this time using the built-in WP gallery:
