Rotator Cuff Repair ups and downs

I haven’t been writing much honestly about my rotator cuff surgery recovery. I think I’m afraid to scare people off. It’s definitely not a linear journey. Lots of ups and downs. I may be too impatient because I’ve had chronic pain of one type or another for years, and I’m getting sick of it. It wears on a person. I swear I am not bipolar, but someone reading an unfiltered account from me, they might wonder. Sometimes I’ve felt like I’m happy and finally making some progress. Another day I wonder if the surgery was a huge mistake.

Today I’m wondering how hard to push things. I should learn more about basic anatomy so I could at least accurately describe stupid aches and pains. I think it’s the upper bicep that’s particularly cranky today. Directly below my deltoid (I think). It’s sensitive and tender even when I hardly do anything. It’s probably nothing serious, but I seem to have a hard time judging what is healthy or unhealthy hurt.

I recently hit my 110 day streak of physical therapy. They finally cut me back to doing exercises once a day instead of twice. At first I thought yay, that means I’m making progress, right? Then I felt like such a wimp, to only do things once a day. I’ve alternated which ones to through in twice a day; usually the harnest or newest.

The therapist increased one exercise from 5 pounds to 15 in 2 sessions. I realize that probably nothing for healthy active people. But for surgery recovery, that's tripling the load in a short span. At first I thought yay, I didn’t collapse with 15 pounds. Then I tried to do them at home, and it seemed unrealistically hard. Maybe the point was to only tax my muscle that much once in a while. I had a 15 pound weight at home, so why not? It’s probably not that specific exercise that’s taxing right now. Though it’s hard to say, when I’ve got 15+ exercises to do daily and it only twinges later, not durin the activity. We reduced the number of exercises down from 20, which I also feel guilty about. A couple of the easier ones made sense to drop off. And I was sick of getting up so early to crank out the first set before work. On the other hand, now that I’m up to a minimum of 5 pounds, I can do some exercises in the gym at work. That’s another nice way to break them up.

Anyway, apologies if anyone wanted to hear more from me during this recovery process. I jotted down lots of notes, but usually thought it wasn't important, valuable, or so on. Mostly it would probably scare people from having what might be necessary surgery. I might not deal with things like pain as well as others.