It's What We Make Of It

Yesterday I did not go sight-seeing or to the fitness center.

Long story, short: We had a power outage in the middle of the night. Being awake for a couple of hours in the middle of the night makes me feel like a zombie the next day. You get the idea.

Oh, and the thunderstorms that were forecast for Thursday were a day late. It's been raining and storming all day.

Days like this can make me feel a little lazy. Two days in a row and I start feeling like a slacker.

But then I was talking to a friend who reminded me that we don't have to run/bike/swim every single day. There are other ways to get in our fitness. Just cleaning the house can be a workout. Fitness is what we make of it, not how much we can do!

This made me think about what I did do on my so-called lazy days:

1. I foam rolled

2. I did more trigger point therapy on my VM

3. I did some strength training: stability ball, core, knee strength exercises

4. I took walks

5. I let my body rest ---> it's true. Rest is important!

I also did some more reading on the vastus medialis and learned a few more things. Like, a weak VM can cause the knee cap to not track properly and a tight VM can lead to knee pain.

I found a couple of exercise videos that focus on strengthening the VMO, but liked this one the most. I'm sharing in case you are dealing with the same symptoms and because we all need to protect our knees with strong quad muscles.

But I also liked this one from Popsugar ---> leg strengthening workout. 

My left leg is still very weak compared to my right. I'm now on a mission to change that. Otherwise, I fear my knee problems will continue to haunt me. Ever since my knee surgery in December, my range of motion has been limited. This makes doing a simple quad stretch extremely uncomfortable and awkward. The added knee pain made me drop the ball and stop stretching. I had no idea how tight my quad had become or how much relief my knee would feel after dedicating a couple of minutes to this simple stretch.

Today I'm thankful for resting, trigger point therapy, and stretching. My knee continues to feel better. And that makes me happy.