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dragonmom · Dec 31, 2010, 09:52 AM

Hi all, I desperately need to lose weight and keep it off, but I can't find any exercises that I can safely do either due to my back, or an old injury to my elbow.

When I was 19 years old, I snapped the head of my radius off on my right arm. It was surgically corrected using a pin, and the doctors told me I only had a 20% chance of getting full range of motion back. I got about 95% back, I just can't fully extend the arm.

My back I injured when I was 18 years old. I had 3 herniated disks in my lower lumbar area. I did physical therapy for 2 years and received a cortizone injection to my back before at the age of 20, I had a microdeskectomy on my L5-S1. I was relatively pain free, with the exception of some nerve damage to my left leg until I was pregnant with my son.us At 22 I had him by c-section due to risks of my disks rupturing towards my spinal cord.
Now I can barely move, but my doctors won't do anything for me, and I know this extra weight I'm carrying isn't helping matters.
I've shrunk down to 5'2" from my previous height of 5'5" and ballooned from my previous weight of 140lbs to about 210lbs.

Any help would be very much appreciated.

Wondergirl · Dec 31, 2010, 10:04 AM

I'm sorry to hear your movement is so limited. Are there changes you can make as to what you put into your mouth? That would be the easiest place to start.

When you say you can "barely move," what does that mean? Can you walk? Bend? Sit? Move arms and legs? Could you, for instance, lie in bed and move your legs back and forth, together and apart for, say, ten times? Could you sit in a kitchen chair and lift each leg and straighten it out so many times in a row?

brandiearmyvet · Jan 1, 2011, 08:55 PM

I really need some more details on your limited movement. I am now 36 and have had disk issues since I was 21. I had a diskectomy in my neck when I was 29 and am OK from that. I also have lower back issues from L1 through all of the Siatic area. I have the low back of a 55 year old. I can say that you are right the weight is causing some of your issues. I am 5'5' as well or there abouts when this all started and I am now 5'4. Not to bad or the number of years but it has always been aout weight management and core muscle stability. From my experience ( 2 kids both c-section) this is not a fast or easy process. First if your Dr's are not working with you get some new ones. Second get a really good back brace, the really wide one, it will also help with healing the c-section muscles. Use a recliner and good posture until you can get into a more up right chair. Stay away from the couch, it is not your friend. Eat fruit, veggies, chicken, no skin, use cooking spray instead of oil on just about everything. Make your own salad dressing, balsamic vinigar, olive oil, peper, fresh onion and diced pepers. Have fun with it. Stay from creamy stuff, it tastes so good but it will stay forever. Or at least until you are able to be active daily. If you are able to walk do so. At one point my husband would poke fun at me since I did not want to risk getting hurt so I would walk back and forth in my living room and kitchen for 15 minutes then as I could go longer I would. I just did what I could as I could. I googled and anything that made sense for ME I would try as I suggest you do for you. This is your life take control of it. Yes I know you hurt bad I know how the weight makes it worse and I can say I probably understand a lot of the other things you feel but have not said. Take contrrol. Take each day and make a calendar. Make E change a week. Until you feel you can handel more. Also understand that it takes 28 days for any change to become a perm part of our life, so if you slip the clock starts again and that is OK. We are human and every mistake is actually a learning event. I wish you and your family the best of luck.

dragonmom · Jan 19, 2011, 10:52 AM

Sorry it took so long to write back, life is crazy. I tend to eat fairly healthy, I know I can cut something's out that aren't helping, soda being the main enemy.

Movement wise, I can't fully extend my right arm, my back varies day to day. Some days I can do so many crunches and push ups, some days I can barely get out of bed. Under this gut of mine, I do have a strong core, I've been working on it longer than I have had the back issues, and especially more after to help support my spine. My left leg I have some issues with. After the surgery it took about a month to get all feeling back in that leg, and since it I haven't been able to fully stretch it out.

If I haven't answered everything, just ask again and I'll try to fully answer everything

brandiearmyvet · Jan 19, 2011, 12:35 PM

Ok so you can walk. At least on some days and that is what you have to do. You have to move; as I'm sure you already know. Stop doing sit ups and cunches work on stabilization of the core muscles and cut out un necessary calories, like soda. Switch to some of the flavored water. I made a slow switch and lost weight just with that change. The most important thing you can do and need to do is move, walk do not push to had but you do need to push yourself some. Good luck. Shape magazine has been putting a focus on core stabilization in their mag, or you can Google it.