I have never thought of myself as particularly inept, clumsy or accident-prone. But still, I have had my share of accidents, injuries, fractures and sprains.
Knocked out front teeth - can I help it that baseball took a bad hop?
Separated shoulder during judo practice in the Marine Corps - hey, I'm not a tough guy, never was. I only learned enough to be dangerous to myself.
Broken arm while playing handball while at U.C. Berkeley - my wife was pregnant at the time. We made quite a pair.
Sprained ankle while playing tennis in New Mexico - when a stray ball rolls over from the adjacent court, play is supposed to stop. Nobody saw it, or at least called it. I stepped on it while running full blast to retrieve a lob. It was a terribly painful sprain, but I recovered 100 percent.
A fall on glare ice in Minnesota's frozen tundra and repeat performance here? Seems to happen all the time. For some time I had a sore shoulder - certain motions in the gym were painful. My left arm and shoulder ached when playing the accordion. I thought it was simple tendonitis - maybe it was. But in January I slipped on some snow-covered ice and landed partly on my left elbow and shoulder.
That did it. Iron Mike's ace practitioners at the Monroe Clinic recommended an MRI. It showed a "minor tear" in my left rotator cuff. Another one of Mike's ace practitioners recommended surgery. I was reluctant - the forecast was an arm in a sling for six weeks and a long, slow recovery after that. But to delay would only make it worse.
I told my accordion-playing friends, Bobbie Edler, Henry Blumer, and Del Heins, that I wouldn't be playing for a while. As fate would have it, the very night I told Henry at Turner Hall that I wouldn't be playing for a while, Henry's son, Kenny, was with him, in the recovery phase of rotator cuff surgery - just completing the six-week sling phase.
April 11 was the dreaded day. I didn't feel a thing until I woke up - then some pain, and a few hours later it really hit. Pain and arm in a sling that seemed to be the most cumbersome device invented by man. Sleep was impossible the first couple of nights, as much out of frustration as pain. I hate taking pills - I think this country is over-medicated. I don't want to sound like a pansy, but I reluctantly, and at my wife's insistence, took a few pain pills those first few nights.
I had injuries before, but this one really zapped me. No more columns for a while, no doubt to the applause of our more ideologically inclined local Republicans. Heck, even they deserve a break now and then. It wasn't only typing with one hand that was the problem; it was more a lack of mental and physical energy.
After a few days, I settled into a routine. Thanks to a sympathetic wife who endured my complaining and an electric chair - no, not that kind - things got marginally better. I could at least walk without the motion jarring my shoulder. The electric chair had an arm that moved my arm in a passive motion to keep the shoulder from freezing up through lack of use. It was a relaxing device, and I increased the range of passive motion every day.
A few weeks into the "sling period," Iron Mike's ace physical therapists came into the picture, stretching my arm and shoulder, and giving me some passive exercises. At long last, the six weeks passed. At least with that colorless drab spring weather we had, I didn't miss much outside activity anyway.
With the sling off, I'm still constrained. I now have a good excuse for no heavy lifting for a while. I won't be playing the accordion for a while and, as all who are familiar with this type of injury have warned, it will be a long road back. But the arm and shoulder are feeling stronger and my range of motion is increasing, especially these last few days. It is now on to strengthening exercises.
Although I've had my share of fractures, sprains and mishaps, I guess I'm lucky. When I think of growing up on the farm, climbing silos and haylofts, dealing with temperamental livestock and operating machinery, there are a lot of bad things that could have happened but didn't. All told, I got off easy.
This drill has prevented me from leaving this perennially cloudy weather for a trip to sunny New Mexico. People keep asking me when I'm going. I keep replying, "soon." I would like to have traveled across Kansas during the June wheat harvest - golden wheat, combines kicking up chaff and dust drifting off in the breeze, blue skies, and wide open roads. But with this drill, my schedule has collapsed on me.
Maybe in July. Meanwhile, between one Dr. Lance repairing my shoulder and another Dr. Lance keeping my spine in line, well, things are looking up.
- John Waelti's column, not counting two-month breaks for injury recovery, appears every Friday in the Times. He can be reached at jjwaelti1@tds.net.
Knocked out front teeth - can I help it that baseball took a bad hop?
Separated shoulder during judo practice in the Marine Corps - hey, I'm not a tough guy, never was. I only learned enough to be dangerous to myself.
Broken arm while playing handball while at U.C. Berkeley - my wife was pregnant at the time. We made quite a pair.
Sprained ankle while playing tennis in New Mexico - when a stray ball rolls over from the adjacent court, play is supposed to stop. Nobody saw it, or at least called it. I stepped on it while running full blast to retrieve a lob. It was a terribly painful sprain, but I recovered 100 percent.
A fall on glare ice in Minnesota's frozen tundra and repeat performance here? Seems to happen all the time. For some time I had a sore shoulder - certain motions in the gym were painful. My left arm and shoulder ached when playing the accordion. I thought it was simple tendonitis - maybe it was. But in January I slipped on some snow-covered ice and landed partly on my left elbow and shoulder.
That did it. Iron Mike's ace practitioners at the Monroe Clinic recommended an MRI. It showed a "minor tear" in my left rotator cuff. Another one of Mike's ace practitioners recommended surgery. I was reluctant - the forecast was an arm in a sling for six weeks and a long, slow recovery after that. But to delay would only make it worse.
I told my accordion-playing friends, Bobbie Edler, Henry Blumer, and Del Heins, that I wouldn't be playing for a while. As fate would have it, the very night I told Henry at Turner Hall that I wouldn't be playing for a while, Henry's son, Kenny, was with him, in the recovery phase of rotator cuff surgery - just completing the six-week sling phase.
April 11 was the dreaded day. I didn't feel a thing until I woke up - then some pain, and a few hours later it really hit. Pain and arm in a sling that seemed to be the most cumbersome device invented by man. Sleep was impossible the first couple of nights, as much out of frustration as pain. I hate taking pills - I think this country is over-medicated. I don't want to sound like a pansy, but I reluctantly, and at my wife's insistence, took a few pain pills those first few nights.
I had injuries before, but this one really zapped me. No more columns for a while, no doubt to the applause of our more ideologically inclined local Republicans. Heck, even they deserve a break now and then. It wasn't only typing with one hand that was the problem; it was more a lack of mental and physical energy.
After a few days, I settled into a routine. Thanks to a sympathetic wife who endured my complaining and an electric chair - no, not that kind - things got marginally better. I could at least walk without the motion jarring my shoulder. The electric chair had an arm that moved my arm in a passive motion to keep the shoulder from freezing up through lack of use. It was a relaxing device, and I increased the range of passive motion every day.
A few weeks into the "sling period," Iron Mike's ace physical therapists came into the picture, stretching my arm and shoulder, and giving me some passive exercises. At long last, the six weeks passed. At least with that colorless drab spring weather we had, I didn't miss much outside activity anyway.
With the sling off, I'm still constrained. I now have a good excuse for no heavy lifting for a while. I won't be playing the accordion for a while and, as all who are familiar with this type of injury have warned, it will be a long road back. But the arm and shoulder are feeling stronger and my range of motion is increasing, especially these last few days. It is now on to strengthening exercises.
Although I've had my share of fractures, sprains and mishaps, I guess I'm lucky. When I think of growing up on the farm, climbing silos and haylofts, dealing with temperamental livestock and operating machinery, there are a lot of bad things that could have happened but didn't. All told, I got off easy.
This drill has prevented me from leaving this perennially cloudy weather for a trip to sunny New Mexico. People keep asking me when I'm going. I keep replying, "soon." I would like to have traveled across Kansas during the June wheat harvest - golden wheat, combines kicking up chaff and dust drifting off in the breeze, blue skies, and wide open roads. But with this drill, my schedule has collapsed on me.
Maybe in July. Meanwhile, between one Dr. Lance repairing my shoulder and another Dr. Lance keeping my spine in line, well, things are looking up.
- John Waelti's column, not counting two-month breaks for injury recovery, appears every Friday in the Times. He can be reached at jjwaelti1@tds.net.
