Electroshock

Yoga may have the appearance of a gentle sport, but don’t be fooled. I managed to massively overstretch my rotator cuff in a vicious Thread the Needle last month and keep reinjuring it doing Chaturanga.

So, having bollocksed it up again yesterday morning, I decided to seek medical attention at my favorite sports clinic where the charming old doctors spend more time unearthing their English than they do diagnosing me. It seems to work like this: sensei mispronounces my name, ask me where I am from and how long I’ve been here; I smile and chitchat politely and tell them what hurts, how I did it, and what I think the injury probably is. Next, they nod and say “Yes, yes. What would you like me to do for you?” and then I prescribe my own course of therapy. X-ray, painkillers…they deal it out just the way I want. So you can see why this is my clinic of choice.

Today I got a bonus surprise along with my Loxonin. Electroshock physiotherapy!

It was fun and it seems to have helped some. The technician cupped two vacuum things onto my shoulder and turned the knob until I said “Oh!” then left me for ten minutes. The sensation was sort of buzzy and twitchy depending where on the sweep the frequency was. I watched my arm jerk around a little and moved my shoulder around to see if there was any effect. It didn’t hurt and it was less intense than going hip deep in the electric bath in the local sento.