I wanted to share with you some ideas of dealing with osteo-arthritis in the hips—and trying to avoid hip replacement surgery, or at least delay it as long as possible.

I was formally diagnosed with OA in November 2004, although I had suspected for some time that arthritis was the cause of my troubles. For many years, I had played one or two hours of tennis a day but I was starting to be competitive and had increased my court time to three to five hours a day with spinning on the days when tennis was rained out. Starting in August 2004, I had started to suffer from low grade pain all day and all night, with no amount of rest able to stop the pain. When my orthopedic surgeon ran through the options, he pushed hard for physiotherapy as a first step. Non-stop pain-killers, steroid injections under an x-ray, his replacement surgery all sounded less attractive than PT.

After two months of PT twice a week, the pain had subsided and I went off to India to play tennis for four hours a day for a week. The tennis was wonderful but still painful and I decided to take a break and let the PT do its full job.

Two years have come and gone. I have traveled to many countries—Czech Republic, Slovakia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Dubai, Bahrain, Oman, Mexico and more. The snow on cobblestones hurt me in some places. In others, it was just the uneven payment beneath my feet. My core strength has increased dramatically and the PT has given my washboard abs—better than I thought any 54-year-old woman could develop. My butt has become flat and lost the indent from weak muscles. I found a personal yoga instructor who showed me how to do the stretches in ways that do not injure me and now I do at least two hours a day of stretching and strengthening. My plan now is to learn how to surf. (I rented a beach house in La Jolla Shores in southern California. On my vacation, I watch the surfers carve the waves, wanting to be one of them.) And just maybe, I can play tennis again.

So what has worked best for me? Here are my tips.

See rheumatoid arthritis treatment – all information in one place.

· Finding a physio-therapist who is used to working with professional athletes and dancers.

· Doing all the PT stretches once a day religiously before I go to work and then a shortened set of stretches plus the strengthening exercises in the evening before going to bed.

· Using music, mirrors (in gyms) or downloaded radio news (at home) to distract me during the hours required to stretch and strengthen.

· Adding specific yoga stretches to my workout.

· Taking the approach of sneaking up on my body. I monitor my workouts and limit the increase in length to no more then 10 percent more than the last workout (even when I am feeling great and want to do more.)

Here’s more:

· Warrior I and II force my hips to rotate without pulling on my knees (but I have to keep the bent knee over the 2nd-3rd toes of the planted foot.)

· Cobra opens my chest and surprisingly releases the pull on my knees.

· Bridge engages the Ilio Psoas (which otherwise gets irritated by my arthritic hips). To make this work, I have to do the bridge without engaging the gluts as follows: (1) breathe in, (2) raise the core while breathing out and feeling the Ilio Psoas kick in, (3) breathe in, (4) lower the core while breathing out.

· Self-massage of the IT Band (taking your knuckles down the line of the IT Band) helps to release more tension from the knee.

The bridge and cobra were recommended by my PT who described the process as turning on what should be turned on, turning off what should be turned off.

Massages of the Ilio Psoas would also be helpful but I cannot do it myself and it is hard to find therapists who know how to get in and massage such deep muscles.

So far all is working. My orthopedic surgeon says that I now have “normal” levels of flexibility, but then adds “normal for a stiff person.” The next stage will be to achieve normal levels for an average person–and, yes, learning how to hang-ten on a southern California wave. In the meantime, I added some rotational core exercises with a pilates-ring to see if tennis (maybe competitive tennis) can once again be in my future.

What are you finding that works?

i did a quick search a found it to be reasonable good printer for the $, so are there any others i should look into, before i fire the baby up.

I think this week, office depot had an ad for a $100 after rebates brother b/w laser printer. Looked like a good deal. But are you looking for a color printer?

wow did’nt know they made just b/w printers, but yes it’s gotta be color, then again the printer da wife just beat the crap out of seemed like a b/w cause it hardly ever anything right.you can see best printer for under $100 here.

buy a canon or epson printer, since their generic inks are cheaper than hp.

I have several Wusthof Classic Knives Review which I love. But recently, I aquired a couple of left handed Misono UX10 japanese knives which leaves my Wusthof chef’s knife in the dust. And because it’s left handed, I don’t have to worry about anyone else in the house using it. They can use the Wusthofs.

For the last 14 years we’ve used our Wusthof classics and have loved them. However after buying and using an Aritsugu knife from Japan I have a newfound respect for how a great knife can feel when you are cutting. Absolutely amazing. I still recommend the Wusthof as a good knife. Like Rachel mentions, it is all in how it feels in your hand. How is the balance, how does the handle feel. Everyone will experience it differently.

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