James,

I have a story to share from my own training, and a suggestion for your next muscular issue flair-up. 

As per Sean's advice, I have been doing a leg workout protocol to try to build my knees back up, so that I can push myself more in badminton and the stick fighting. I'm not doing much upper body training, and my weight training in the upper body is sporadic and minimal. At work the other day (Thursday), I wrenched my left shoulder to pull an object out of a badly-packed work van, and I didn't feel a pop or anything, but my left shoulder hurt a lot the next 2 days. I played badminton on Saturday morning with an emphasis on the warm-up and stretching, to see if I could improve the situation by taking things a little easier but maintaining some activity. If anything, my shoulder felt worse, almost like my arm was going to fall off, so I stopped after about an hour of play. I went home, and as a last-ditch effort, hopped in the shower. 

In the shower, I alternated in minute intervals warm water and turning off the warm water (tap water in baltimore is low 50's this time of year), and focused the stream of water on the parts of my body where I had aches and pains—my shoulders and my lower back. after 2 cold water intervals, my shoulder felt almost fine! Slightly tight, but all pain had gone away, and although the range of motion had slightly diminished due to the tighter, colder muscles, the parts of that range of motion where I had felt intense pain previously gave no feedback at all. I did another round of alternating hot and cold and got out, feeling much better It's sunday now, and I'm going to take another alternating shower after this email, and I expect to go to badminton tonight and have a much better time than I did yesterday. 

The model I'm working off of is that when you get a pull or otherwise irritate soft tissue, the body sends healing compounds and platelets to the area through the bloodstream. Once there, the body does some repair but tends to leave behind platelets and hard gunk (hence the cracking/grinding in injured joints after the body has healed). This crackly stuff partially immobilizes the joint to discourage you from overextending or overusing the joint in the future, but it doesn't actually help the joint to keep it around, so it typically just builds up in people's joints overtime. Hence the normal "scoping" that athletes need in their knees in their 50's, among other issues. The alternating heat and cold sends bloodflow to the area, then squeezes the muscles, driving the crackly stuff out of the soft tissue back into the bloodstream, where it can be disposed of. I think that by default this is probably a good post-workout activity for me, so I'll be doing this more going forward. 

This is probably the same effect people get from alternating heating and icing of areas, but it's such a pain to actually gather the necessary materials to do this for healing that most people (I'm guilty of this) do a couple rounds after an injury and decide that they've healed well enough. The hot/cold showers, in contrast, require no extra material, take less time, and can be incorporated into normal daily activity with ease. 

I know that you are at a healthy weight now, and you're very relaxed when working out, so you probably don't need this advice or information for the most part, but I thought you might want it in your back pocket. If you want to try it out, I think you should try it next time your hernia flairs up. It will be unpleasant, but if it works, the results should be apparent as soon as you get out of the shower. 

Anyway, I hope you're well. If you have any thoughts on this, I'd be very curious to hear them. I'm looking forward to seeing you whenever you're in town. 

-Brick Mouse

…

Thank you for this. I have used hot water often for my breathing problems and osthio arthritis. The hot-cold treatment I have used on my hands and lumbar. Interestingly, this reminds me of the ancient Roman bathing system, who I think employed three temperature ranges in their bath therapy.

After an unusually healthy autumn and winter I was hit by another government plague issued to a young vaxxed Army inductee and spread to the rest of us. I used the rest of the ivermectin you gave me, two zpacks and steroids and am hopefully turning the corner. It is brutally cold right now and my mental acuity is way down, to the point where I just scrapped a few article outlines and can’t recall where the hand towels are.

Fasting, reducing weight and length of hiking strides seems to have reduced the swelling of the two side walls of the lower abdomen. Thanks for your well wishes, and if wicked Fortune looks the other way I should be hauling my rucksack up the steps of the Brickmouse House the first week of May, some few months before this gift from you will be posted.

Thank you, and thank you.

James, Friday February 24 2023