[perl4ever]

I am trying to exercise regularly in a gym, and I am finding that joint discomfort/pain is the limiting factor. When you're in your 20s or even your 30s, you don't generally think about that.

But enough IT types talk about RSI problems, wrists and such, that it ought to be on the radar screen if you are considering a physical job.

An uncle of mine had a physical job in a hospital most of his life and suffered from spinal stenosis, which I believe caused incredible pain in his retirement.

My mother was a computer programmer, but the whole reason she got a college degree was because she studied like mad in high school, because she was driven by escaping manual labor on the family farm. None of her siblings became farmers.

[RaceWon]

I had an orthopedic surgeon from the HSS (He taught Anatomy and Orthopedic Surgery at NYU) once, who told me to Always use your body even when if it hurts to do so because of an injury.

3 years ago I had a severe allergic reaction to an antibiotic, which affected the nerves in my dominant arm. This was painful to the point of waking me up from sleep and my arm was almost useless in certain ranges of motion. Prior to this I had neglected working out for about 5 years, but started again; it took about a year but my arm is back to normal now and I can do more consecutive pushups than my age... and I'm 58.

Ignore the pain and workout.

[justinator]

I'm generally for the idea of staying active, to promote healing with prescribed movement and 30 hours/week of physicsl activity isn't unheard of in my life -

but I'm not sure "always" is the right answer ... always.

I do agree that a lack of physical exercise can cause its own type of pain that counterintuitively can be relieved with movement, or the best thing after a long run is a brisk jog the next day, but if I severly sprain an ankle, maybe it's best to just rest that ankle for a while.

[specialist]

I know you're right. I have chronic pain (from GVHD). I almost always do better after exercise, activity. But getting started is very hard.

What helps me is having someone, anyone around, to distract me from myself.