Shoulder surgery? Ouch! That hits me where I live! Three years ago at this time I was recovering from a motorcycle accident where my shoulder was dislocated--very badly. I have NO idea how I avoided surgery other than a very, very astute orthopedist whose prompt actions and un-orthodox casting allowed it to heal naturally. Didn't sleep more than an hour at a time for months, and my wife never knew where she'd find me in the morning--where-ever I could fall asleep next.

The doc sent me to P/T as well and THAT was as important as his actions. 6 months of grueling P/T, but it worked. I always say attack P/T like it's an enemy. I'm not super-agressive, but I saw that the harder I worked, the better my chances of recovery.

Lowering total alkalinity is VERY confusing. Let me try to clear it up.

1) T/A and pH are linked. As pH goes up or down, so does T/A.

2) There are very few ways to move either T/A or pH MORE than the other.

We can raise T/A more than pH by adding baking soda. We can raise pH more than T/A by aerating.

That's it.

3) But we can ONLY raise pH via aeration when pH is 7.2 or less.

4) So we LOWER pH to 7.0-7.2, which pulls T/A down (see 1) again). We don't go lower than 7.0 because below 6.9 vinyl can be damaged. Concrete/Plaster/Gunite is not as sensitive to pH.

5) We then aerate which raises pH WITHOUT raising T/A--it's the ONLY way to do it. (Why does this work? Ask Chem_Geek--he's the BEST at explaining it)

6) We then repeat 4) and 5) again and again until T/A is where we want it.

Once you understand which action does what, it makes a lot more sense. Aeration does NOT lower T/A--that's frequently mis-understood--it's dropping pH to 7.0-7.2 that does it. Aeration raises pH without raising T/A.