Pain

I can't remember when's the last time I felt pain so acutely as I do now.

My back and my thighs are killing me, sending shooting pains that feel like needles whenever I attempt to walk or do nothing remotely mobile.

To give an illustration on how bad it was, when I got up this morning, I had to roll myself off, because I couldn't bend my back. Then when I got to a half-prostrate position, I had to stop every 5 seconds as I straightened myself up vertebrae by vertebrae because it was just so freaking painful.

I can't walk up or down the stairs without holding onto something, and whenever I drop something on the floor, I can't pick it up.

Suddenly, I feel like I completely understand the frustrations of the disabled. We take for granted what comes so easy to us.

Now the question: why am I in such pain?

I wish I had a more glamorous reason as to why I've been inflicted with such agony - such as, jumping into the ocean to save a drowning person and swimming to shore for the next few hours, or, playing football and scoring a hat-trick, but spraining my back in the process..

but no. Truth be told. I am in agony because I played netball yesterday.

And totally underestimating the sport, I did no warm-ups, not warm-downs, just straight in, played like a maniac, 5 matches, till the semi-finals. After which when I walked off the court after our team won the third place, I felt my legs go all wobbly and that was when I realized I might hurt today - but nothing prepared me for THIS!

Now I feel like an achy, grandma, and it's so sad because I've always thought I'd be invincible and immune to back pain forever.

****

TWO days of MC and a lot of drugs later, I'm feeling much better. If there's one thing I learnt, it's never to underestimate the sport. I'm never playing netball again without proper warm-ups.

The other is: our marketing division is slightly er, behaviourally regressive. There was this female team captain who looked like she was about sec 4 - and she kept going "marketing... woosh!" throughout the tournament. I kid you not. I had goose bumps creeping along my arm whenever I heard it... and when they finally won their match, they started doing "hip hip hooray" cheers for themselves... (three times in a row!) as a verbal pat on their backs.

I guess there's nothing wrong with a bit of team spirit.. but they were so delusionally serious about the whole thing, they didn't realize that everyone else was laughing at them from a distance away....