A shot of relief

Ever since my surgery last October I've been struggling with the annoying pain in my left shoulder.  And ever since the swim meet in February and all those yards I put in it wasn't really getting better.  In March I pulled back my yardage quite a bit.  Still no complete recovery.  So I broke down and went to see Dr. Richards again.  He suggested two options:

1.  A Blood platelet infusion (or something like that) which he said was like stem cells where it would stimulate growth in the tendon, but would include a 3 week recovery with no swimming.
2. Another cortisone shot.  This option for me in the past only lasts a few months.  Hopefully long enough to last through the first half of August.  

I opted for the cortisone shot.  I'm too close to August to be out of the water that long.  

This morning when I woke up it was very very tender as expected.  I didn't plan to swim this morning, but I knew I'd be able to at least get in tonight and perhaps do a little breaststroke.  By the time this afternoon came around the tenderness was almost completely gone.

I met Josh, and Chad at the marina and we did one mile loops just outside the marina.  There are four buoys that we wrapped around.  At the corner of each buoy we waited to regroup and then take off again.  After last week, I'm a little more mindful of staying relatively close to each other.  Otherwise we might as well be swimming on our own. 

The water temp was 60 degrees!  There was only a slight ripple in the water and it felt great!  There were some places where the water actually felt warm.  It was so fun!  I often thought to myself, "This is about how cold the channel will be in August".  I was so excited!  I was REALLY tempted to go for a third lap, but I had to get home, plus I didn't want to push my shoulder too soon after the shot.  

Looking forward to Thursday afternoon to swim at the marina again!

Total Distance: 2.00 easy pace miles according to GPS in 1:10.