broken bones

[krazy_1]

this sucks! i just went to the doc yesterday, turns out i cracked on of the bones in my arm. i'm out of climbing pretty much for the next 6 - 8 weeks.

 

question is; have any of you luvlies broken an arm, and what did you do so as not to loose those precious climbing muscles and not get desk ass. nintendo was already sudggested. is there any others?

[freeclimb9]

weight training on other parts of the body helps limit muscle wasting on the healing limb. Go to the gym, and work on your legs and torso.

[sk]

Krazy1- BUMMER!! sorry to hear you have an injury. that sucks. I have a conective tissue muscle injury in my shoulder that I have been fighting with fo 10 years or more. YOU DON"T WANT TO DO THAT! let your arm heal well the first time. you wont regret it. do other things. walk, hike, chase cute boys you know, keep your self entertained, but HEAL!

 

sk

[krazy_1]

yeah i could probably try top roping something easy... but i know i won't stop there.

 

i guess i'll just have to go with sk's idea of chasing cute boys! then i can make them mow my lawn, wash my truck and do some laundy. hee hee

[Jedi]

You gotta let it heal. I am bad about trying to get back to my favorite activities too soon after an injury. Just no patients. I broke both bones in my left arm when I was 12. They healed in 3 weeks (stuff heals faster when you are young). Broke my left hand once, some ribs in the 5th grade and shortened my left arm half an inch 2 years ago. That took 9 weeks before I got the external fixator off. With the crushed cartilage in my wrist, it was 10 months before it was fully operational. I climbed 5.3 with one hand on top rope. it felt good to just be out and about.

I broke a toe this year and still went to Alaska with the bone in 2 pieces. Custom liners kept the pressure off that toe and front pointing was not a problem.

Just listen to your body, don't rush it, and work around the arm. Listen to your doctor.

Hope you heal up like new.

Jedi

[Thinker]

Sorry to hear that Krazy. How'd it happen?

[allison]

Do NOT TR something easy. If you don't let the wing heal properly, you will suffer much, much longer, and as an added bonus your doctor might have to REbreak it for you. Sound like fun?

 

DO NOT ignore doctor's orders!!

[lizard_brain]

If you get impatient and push it now, you'll pay for it later. A couple of weeks now can mean months or years of greater discomfort or even an early retirement from climbing later.

 

But don't listen to me...I'm not a doctor. This information is worth what you paid for it. Listen to your doctor.

[jon]

quote:

---

Originally posted by lizard brain:

If you get impatient and push it now, you'll pay for it later. A couple of weeks now can mean months or years of greater discomfort or even an early retirement from climbing later.

---

Exactly!!! A friend of mine harmlessly broke his finger but he didn't take care of it and after a surgery he is still stuck with this ugly mangled finger forever. This advice doesn't apply to broken bones but to any injury. The mountains are going anywhere, let your body heal!

[krazy_1]

ALRIGHT ALREADY...... (heehee) so i won't go climbing. i'm going to be needing a searious fix when i'm done doing my time. THIS SUPER SUX!

 

how did it happen you ask? mt. adams, one of those early-mornin retreats, slipped in da dirt, just a nasty catch on a da nice typical lava chunks of crap up there. didn't even know i broke it till 5 days later. i think i deserve some climb/credit points for the high pain tolerence. humm? humm?

[Bronco]

If you were really tough, you'd amputate and get a special prothetic designed like the head of an ice axe to reduce down time.

[krazy_1]

say you know that's a thought! and i could pull one of those edward scissorhands kinda deals. that will be a bitch when i put my contacts in - but HEY no down time if there was ice!

[Jonathan]

Good luck with your arm. Listen to your moms and don’t push recovery too hard.

 

The other injury you can't rush are torn or otherwise distressed rotator cuffs. I understand them as the tendons of four of the muscles in the shoulder area. The cuffs really don't perform any heavy work, but control the motion of the larger muscles. If you think about it, the shoulder constitures a pretty complex system of bone, muscle and tendon. At any rate, all that buff and brawn and muscle bound bluster (OK, I look in the guy mirror) is for naught if the rotator cuffs are compromised.

 

Yours truly zigged when he should have zagged at VW about six moons back. Actually, I'm new to the climbing gym environment and I attempted to hang on when I should have let go while flailing ever so comically on a slightly overhanging route. Ignore your field instincts when you’re at the gym, comrades. I stressed both cuffs, especially the starboard one. Fortunately they were not torn. That's surgery and about a year total of recovery time.

 

PT and exercise is slowly restoring me to about 90% of my former glory. Part of the process is regaining confidence in the shoulders and I can be such a risk adverse weenie. And you know those strange guys you see in the weight room working out with rubber bands and medicine balls? That’s me now. It’s worth a session with a PT to show you a few simple exercises to strengthen the cuffs and help prevent such frustrating down time.

 

Oh and my doc is such a wit: After he diagnoses the injury, he looks at me, not unsympathetically but with some bemusement, raises an eyebrow and says “That’s a common injury for an active man,” then, sotto voce, “your age.”

 

Check out www.medicalmultimediagroup.com/pated/shoulder_problems/cufftear.html for (mis)info on the cuffs that's as good as any other on the web.

[Courtenay]

Hi all,

 

Freeclimb9 and Terrible Ted are right on the money with doing what you can with the rest of your body. You don't want to have the core, legs and mucles in the other arm atrophy while waiting for the affected limb to heal. If you can find a qualified PT who does your sport or activity and who can outline a recovery and activity program for you for the next 1-3 months, do so; that will keep you on track and prevent you from going stir-crazy. When I had arthroscopic knee surgery, I was back on a bike doing (at reduced levels) 1-leg pedalling to keep the other limb strong and help the cardio system--it helped speed me back to activity much more quickly; when I broke a bone in my right foot, I was back on the elliptical cross-trainer 3 days later in my walking boot, and climbed Kilimanjaro 6 weeks later with the help of my aggressive self-PT; same with arm in a cast 15 years ago (from a bike accident) working the other arm to keep the upper body strong. There ARE things you can do, though I'd strongly recommend not getting on a climbing wall until you are healed, as you'll be worse off if you slip and try catching yourself with the affected limb. Be safe, but stay active. Good luck.

[krazy_1]

that is a great sudggestion -

 

does anyone know if VW seattle has a stationary bike......? i go there sometimes in the winter but haven't paid much attention to the weight type area. if anyone knows..... what else they got?

[bobinc]

Yeah -- they have a bike and stairmonster.

 

It's really true what Courtenay says; overall conditioning helps out a great deal in recovery time of specific injuries. You have to be careful, of course, but assuming you are, it will pay off in the long run with the injury.

[freeclimb9]

It's the effect that exercise has on blood chemistry that makes working out important during recovery. Like the Nike slogan, "just do it". You'll benefit.

[krazy_1]

kickasss - i'm on it!

[terrible_ted]

Hey K:

 

Sorry to hear about the arm. It's funny, but I've always considered low-angle stuff to be a much greater hazard than the high-angle stuff... slipping and twisting/fracturing/tweaking/gouging some joint is always out there, while leader falls often result in nothing more than a stretched rope and a freaked-out partner...

 

Don't get too wrapped up in the "Doctors Orders" BS. Most doctors are aimed at restoring full function to a sedentary population with the lowest risk factor. The changes in the treatment of injuries have changed dramatically in the last 20 years, and much of this has been propelled by the advances in sports therapy. Remember the clips last year of Picabo Street doing leg curls a few hours after ACL surgery?? The goals there are a bit different: restore full function as soon as possible.

 

Ask for opinions from other doctors. Keep in mind that someone that graduated from med. school 20 years ago (i.e. a 50 y.o.) may or may not have kept up with recent medical advances. FC9 is right: keep those other muscles working! The higher you keep your metabolism, the faster the healing process works.

 

You have a broken bone, not a damaged tendon. Treatments for the two are very different. Try to call a sports clinic and see if they can offer any advice - perhaps a custom PT session (they show you the exercise, then you go home and repeat on your own dime.) Find one affiliated with the local mega-million dollar professional athletic organization. People that make 10 million a year for their athletic prowess don't spend 6 - 8 weeks down unless it's absolutely necessary. Make sure thats the case.

 

If nothing else, try curling. Pints, that is...

 

-t

[allison]

I'm not saying don't work out, for god's sake I worked out for hours on end with casts on both ankles one summer, but NOT the broken bones. Other body parts.

 

Bones heal way differently than soft tissue as perviously stated, which is why Picabo was doing leg curls right after having tissue work done.

 

The advice about finding a sports med PT who woks with athletes (or ballet dancers) is good though, if you've got the resources these types will get you back in the game faster than and HMO by a long shot.

[krazy_1]

update on the bones - definate fracture, not to bad though.

 

ok - once again "this sucks!"

 

went to visit the doc again....... now i have a hard cast for the next 3 weeks. only 3 weeks though - then i have to wear that other smelly one for another week and i'm back in the game!

[Dru]

jerry moffat was bouldering with a cast on his leg a week after he broke it in a motorbike accident in the early 90's. just dont fall off.

 

i think you can climb slabs without using your arms....broken wing should be no problem. just be glad you aren't a horse cause they shoot'em whn they break a limb.

[allthumbs]

No sweat. I slalom skied one summer with a cast on my leg. Cake.

[krazy_1]

slabbin!......... if you catch the right angle you could probably walk up it

 

sweet! - the way i figure, my arm is probably better protected in a hard cast than a soft one right?........

[Dru]

quote:

---

Originally posted by krazy 1:

slabbin!......... if you catch the right angle you could probably walk up it

 

sweet! - the way i figure, my arm is probably better protected in a hard cast than a soft one right?........

---

you are gonna want to use your arm(s) for balance, yeah I would figure a hard cast but what do I know, ive never broken anything but a few girls' hearts

and some records for most posts to cc.com

 

and i would plan on going in a party of 3 and doing crag type routes cause i would imagine it would be hard to belay all that well with a broken arm. so you are looking for 2 other climbers, one to lead, one to belay, and you just sit around and poach a few topropes.

 

the 5.7 at larabee state park would probably be ideal type of route. or if there is 1 pitch stuff at darrington or static point that you could hike to without having to use your arm to bushwack