Ever had to rehab something?

[JohnnyBuddha]

Hey, anyone here have a nagging injury that requires or has required (in the past) some rehab? Does anyone have any success stories of rehabbing a bad or recurring injury?

I have these winged scapula (my shoulder blades flare out at the back--my chest muscles are pulling my shoulders forward and the muscles in my upper back don't hold them in place like they should) and many injuries in my neck and shoulder seem to stem from them. I've been given exercises to do for them in the past but have regrettably never made a genuine effort to rehab them. I like the idea of having a somewhat normal neck/upper back/shoulders, etc., and I'm thinking about trying my damnedest to get into some routine. Any Chicken Soup for the Rehabbing Athlete's Soul stories? :icon_chee Any tips?

PS--posting this in Conditioning too. It doesn't really seem to fall in one specific subforum.

 

[Theodore]

There's nothing graceful about rehab. It sucks and a lot of time it's painful. You just have to do it. So, you've seen docs/ physical therapists? Sounds to me like your chest is overdeveloped and out of balance w/ your back. I spent about a year in therapy after destroying my left knee. Doc didn't have good things to tell me right after the first surgery, but, I stuck w/ it and am 99% back to normal.

 

[TDonovan]

Hey, anyone here have a nagging injury that requires or has required (in the past) some rehab? Does anyone have any success stories of rehabbing a bad or recurring injury?

I have these winged scapula (my shoulder blades flare out at the back--my chest muscles are pulling my shoulders forward and the muscles in my upper back don't hold them in place like they should) and many injuries in my neck and shoulder seem to stem from them. subforum.

I don't know if I have a winged scapula, because my back looks pretty normal. However my shoulder seem to slope forward and are more injury prone. Whatever you do, don't believe physical therapists or ortho doctors 100%. They have a grim outlook and deal mostly with the physically inactive, obese, or old. Their advice is inadequate and unrealistic and will leave you feeling depressed. Only see doctors who treat athletes, the more pro athletes they see, the better.

I do a lot of internal/external rotation on my shoulder. As well as the same motion pulling from up to down, and down to up. Tons of websites will have that info. Also, doing overhead shrugs, dip shrugs, regular shrugs, rows, and stuff like that are all really good for your shoulder.

 

[Execute]

During football a few years ago I sprained my ankle. Instead of taking a week or two off, I continued to practice. One day we were doing hills and I stepped on a large rock (hard to see since the grass was high) and ended up fracturing my ankle.

I had to quit sports for the year and rehab it my entire senior year.

My advice is to just rehab it and you will be thankful down the road.

 

[indigoluxe]

The only hard and fast rule for rehabbing is don't push through the pain, GIVE YOUR BODY THE TIME IT NEEDS TO RECOVER. It can seem horrendous to take weeks or months off training, but it has to be weighed against a lifetime of pain or impaired training.

My best advice is to go to a GOOD sports physiotherapist (emphasis on sports specialty) and have develop a rehabilitation plan, then follow it.

It's never easy, but you just have to do it.

 

[JohnnyBuddha]

Cool, thanks for the stories. I did see a good sports physiotherapist in the area who treats the university athletes (we have 2 uni's in the city). I just have to stick it out I guess. I'm a student of psychology/Buddhism and it amazes me how difficult these "short-term pain/boredom for long term gain" lessons can be, but they're everywhere in life, and I might as well learn to love 'em.

TDonovan: I don't know a ton about winged scapula, but here's a pic I found that is quite similar to what my upper back looks like when standing "normally"

It's from this site: http://www.exrx.net/Kinesiology/Posture.html#anchor3102554

 

[Nick Kilian]

Has anyone fractured a metcapral? I fractured in 3 months ago and it is still hurting. wtf shouldn't it be good to go soon?

 

[ForeverFiending]

Shin splints that turned to stress fractures... very painful and it took a LONG time to heal.

 

[indigoluxe]

Shin splints that turned to stress fractures... very painful and it took a LONG time to heal.

I had to rehab a nasty shin splint at the end of last year which actually required 2-3 months off running to get back to 100%. The whole time when sitting on my ass not running and while doing my prescribed exercises, I just had to remind myself that if I got up and ran, I could be looking at a stress fracture, which is a LONGER time, 6 months+ right?

 

[Chinaboxer]

about 5 years ago, i completely tore my achilles tendon during training. It was repaired by wrapping the ends back together using cat intestines and staples, then casted in a flexed position to keep pressure off the injury.

Every two months, i had to go back in for recasting, one doctor would push my foot as close to 90 degrees as he could while the other quickly casted the foot into position. this hurt worse than the actual injury. They continued to do this three more times until my foot worked it's way back to 90 degrees.

after over a year, the cast finally came off and my leg shrank to nothing. I had to go into six weeks rehab just to relearn to walk!

After 2 years, i could FINALLY throw a very very very light roundhouse kick on a bag.

2 1/2 years later, i could finally get back into training.

Moral of the story? ALWAYS make sure to drink plenty of water and stretch during training. And make sure to take in enough salt in your diet if you are doing lots of sweating. I learned that salt is what keeps water in the muscle tissues and also keeps from getting muscle cramps during intense training.

Meh...i guess what they say is true. What doesn't kill you only makes you stronger!

 

[danny_171]

Hey, anyone here have a nagging injury that requires or has required (in the past) some rehab? Does anyone have any success stories of rehabbing a bad or recurring injury?

I have these winged scapula (my shoulder blades flare out at the back--my chest muscles are pulling my shoulders forward and the muscles in my upper back don't hold them in place like they should) and many injuries in my neck and shoulder seem to stem from them. I've been given exercises to do for them in the past but have regrettably never made a genuine effort to rehab them. I like the idea of having a somewhat normal neck/upper back/shoulders, etc., and I'm thinking about trying my damnedest to get into some routine. Any Chicken Soup for the Rehabbing Athlete's Soul stories? :icon_chee Any tips?

I'm kind of freaked out about how eerily similar your problem is to mine. Two months ago my shoulder gave out sparring and the doctor put me through to physical therapy. They (as well as guys at the gym) noticed that upper back wasn't properly developed and got me started on exercises to correct the problem. It's quite embarrassing going to the gym only to lift hot pink 2lb weights instead of sparring, but hey, you got to get this shit done. I suggest going to a personal trainer or physical therapy and getting back in shape, it's not a difficult thing to get over if you put in the work.

EDIT: I just remembered that I had a nasty ankle sprain a year ago which put me on the sidelines for 3 months. I successfully rehabbed that and got back to training. I wear an ankle wrap now as a precaution, but it's generally not that difficult to rehab something if you have the desire. That being said, rehab kicks the crap out of training in the unpleasantness department.

 

[TDonovan]

Has anyone fractured a metcapral? I fractured in 3 months ago and it is still hurting. wtf shouldn't it be good to go soon?

I fractured my foot and had a boot on for 6 weeks. When I got the boot off my foot still hurt for some reason. Then I jumped off of an 8 foot tall platform and landed primarily on that foot. I felt something move and it started hurting like hell, so I went home thinking that I re-broke it.

Later on that day it started feeling better than ever. The doctor said I most likely tore some scar tissue that was irritating me. Perhaps that is your problem?

 

[Nick Kilian]

I dunno I still have a large bump where I broke it. Hitting and squeezing still hurts. I would like get this crap healed as everyone around me is fighting except me heh.

 

[NoSmilez]

knee and wrist. very annoying but i been to the pt so many times. i can almost duplicate the same treatment on my body except for the electro stim

 

[aries]

Nothing major really mostly just sprains and strains. Worse was anterior cruciate ligament sprain from heel hook. Had me out for 6 weeks.
Broken minor bones in hands, feet and nose. I'm prone to cut's around eyes. Hyperextended both elbows. Couple of minor concussions.
Recurrent lower back problems. Tight hip flexors. Rotator cuff issues. Most muscle problems rehabbed by strengthening over stretched muscles and stretching overly tight ones.

 

[Michael Wanaka]

I've had to rehab my left shoulder from a separated AC joint in wrestling, lower leg from an ankle lock i should have tapped to but didn't, right index knuckle from repeated injuries, and my right shoulder from too much baseball.

Rehab blows!

 

[millasur]

I fractured my foot and had a boot on for 6 weeks. When I got the boot off my foot still hurt for some reason. Then I jumped off of an 8 foot tall platform and landed primarily on that foot. I felt something move and it started hurting like hell, so I went home thinking that I re-broke it.

Later on that day it started feeling better than ever. The doctor said I most likely tore some scar tissue that was irritating me. Perhaps that is your problem?

When you break bone seriously and affect the skin etc you need to massage the area and use moisteuriser every day to prevent/decrease/remove as much scar tissue as possible, as it is very inflexible and will just tighten up, limiting your range of motion.

'stretch' it by going through the range of motions you can manage, eg dont use your hand to bend your feet, use the muscles in your feet to bend your feet. sometimes u cna use your hands to get a further stretch if you need to.

dependin on the injury there are various things you can do in terms of psyio exercises, but obv for that, speak to your psyio as I can't advise when I don't know the specifics of the injury.

 

[StikyIcky]

Knee and shoulder used to pop constantly, the knee still does on occasion.

Had to go to physical rehab and do isolation exercises. Only good thing about that place was that one of the therapists was a hottie. Other than that, I hated going there. The bastards billed me afterwards too, even though they said the insurance would cover it fully and knew I had no spare income as I was a college student.

Looking back, I could have done better exercises & better strengthening of the muscle on my own.

 

[Goon Dog]

I tore my bicep completely off the forearm bone sparring and had reattachment surgery. Three months of pretty intense rehab and I regained full strength and range of motion. OTOH I've had golfer's elbow for 2 years and can't get rid of it. And no, I don't golf. Hurts like a motherfucker and limits tricep work. Fine for rolling and striking but hurts like a bitch in the mornings.

 

[TDonovan]

When you break bone seriously and affect the skin etc you need to massage the area and use moisteuriser every day to prevent/decrease/remove as much scar tissue as possible, as it is very inflexible and will just tighten up, limiting your range of motion.

'stretch' it by going through the range of motions you can manage, eg dont use your hand to bend your feet, use the muscles in your feet to bend your feet. sometimes u cna use your hands to get a further stretch if you need to.

dependin on the injury there are various things you can do in terms of psyio exercises, but obv for that, speak to your psyio as I can't advise when I don't know the specifics of the injury.

I dunno, I think my unorthodox rehab worked pretty well. I was playing paintball and was standing on some giant tower when some dude started throwing ropes at me. I had no choice but to jump down and return fire. After the jump my foot has been good for over 3 years.

But yeah I see where you are coming from, it's good advice.