Tips for Successful Physical Therapy

Now that I'm halfway through my PT, I have some tips to make similar experiences easier for all of you. I know that it's terribly, terribly generous of me to do such a thing, but really it's no problem. I suffer so that you might learn.

1. Your physical therapist may seem like a nice person, but make no mistake, these people are trained in the art of torture and they have no problem using all of their dark tools on you. After all, it is their job to do so. Oh sure, they'll ask you if you're feeling any pain in the problem area while you're doing the exercises, but that's only so that they might refine their plans to bring pain to all of your other areas. Remember, the point of Physical Therapy is to make other parts of your body scream in pain so that your problem area doesn't feel like as much of a problem.

2. If, after several weeks of PT, your problem area isn't having any more problems, and as a result of this, a little voice is telling you that you don't have to do your daily exercises any more, take this voice by the neck, stuff it in the smallest box you can find, and then toss it in the river. This voice is evil and seeks to only cause you more pain. Not doing your daily exercises will keep your surrounding muscles from being as strong as they need to be for your next session, which means that when your therapist tells you to 400 calf raises while holding seven 40 lb bags of feed, the muscle won't be up for the task and will rip itself out of your body and commit suicide. Then you'll have to explain to your coworkers why you only have one calf muscle.

3. If your PT session is first thing in the morning, you may think that skipping breakfast and your morning coffee will help you save time. This is true, but the resulting loss of energy will cause your leg to shake uncontrollably while performing stretches. This will make the other therapy patients stare at you and be concerned for your safety. Granted, they won't do anything to help as your death may bring them some respite as the therapists fall upon your corpse and devour it, but it's never nice to have Gladys the 74 year old staring at you because your leg is shaking like an epileptic after an episode of Pokemon.

4. When your therapist asks you if you're feeling any pain answering with "Of course I am you devil beast, is that not your foul purpose?!" not only decrease the likelihood that you'll be able to return, damning you to a back alley physical therapist, but it also gives your therapist even more pleasure to see you squirm under their black thumb. Why give them more of your suffering to feast upon?

As you can tell, I've learned a lot in these past few weeks, and I can only imagine the new things I'll learn in the next few. Maybe I'll even learn to walk normally again. At this point, I can only dream.