getting older and recurring aches and pains

As a youngster or even when I was in my 30's, I would kind of scoff at people older than I am that were constantly complaining about some sort of pain that they have regularly but I suppose karma was waiting on my doorstep for a while because now I am the one that is doing the complaining and it is funny and annoying to me that it is like this because I kind of do a lot to keep it from happening yet it still comes.

I am in my 40's, I'm in relatively good shape and I regularly exercise. Yet it seems that basically every single day I have nagging aches and pains and there really isn't anything I can do to make it stop. I guess this is just part of being older and to anyone out there that thinks it isn't going to happen to them, chances are that you are wrong.

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The most common one for me and likely everyone else is lower back pain. I stretch, I have expensive pillows and a rather expensive mattress as well, yet it is basically guaranteed that when I wake up in the morning, a good half hour of it is going to be dedicated to focusing on how my back is killing me. I have purchased a better computer chair because that is where I work, I try to enforce good posture when I am out and about doing almost anything, yet all of this seems to be for naught because I end up feeling like I got hit by a truck the night before almost every morning.

If you are thinking that this is going to be some sort of post where I have answers to this problem, sorry, I do not have them. This is more of a warning of things to come for people out there that are younger than I am. It is coming for you, almost certainly.

I recall when I was in my 20's that my own father had some sort of contraption that hung from a door that he would have to suspend himself from in an effort to do something to his spine in order to relieve back pain. After focusing on that for quite a while my Dad just decided to get on with life and started doing a lot of gardening, no matter what. While I am not recommending that people seek this way out I will say that he experienced greater relief by simply getting on with it than he did from using the neck hanging method. I don't hear my Dad complain about his back and neck as much as he used to so perhaps getting out there and doing some exercise, even if it initially is a bit painful, might be the way to go.

I suppose as we get older that we are always going to be more likely to develop aches and pains but if you think about it, people from long ago didn't have access to chiropractors and other various medical aids that we have today. They had no choice but to just get on with it and I guess they did OK.

I get annoyed by it and try to alleviate it by doing more stretching and what not but I wake up nearly every morning with an aching back as well as some arm and leg stiffness as well. All of this comes from the vigorous activity of sleeping. It's funny because on the days where I will put in some sort of workout that is actually quite taxing, I normally end up waking up the next day feeling considerably better than if I had just taken it easy and spent a bunch of time in a relaxed position. Sure, there might be some extra pain in the parts of my body that I used in whatever exercise I was doing, but for the most part I always feel a bit less terrible than if I did nothing the day prior.

This is one thing that we don't really have over here as a member of the expat community: We don't really have access to reliable medical advice or procedures that can help alleviate this pain. There is a prevailing opinion in the expat world that going to the doctor is only going to result in them giving you a bunch of pills that you could have simply gone to the pharmacy and purchased yourself after doing a bit of internet research. Therefore, most of us don't even bother to go to a doctor for things like what I am describing.

I don't relish the fact that this nagging problem in my life is unlikely to get any better and I can expect that it will get worse. This is just one of those things that we have to accept as we get older. I have no intention of staying home and lying down a bunch in the hopes that it just goes away. I don't think that this has ever worked for anyone.