Well, well, well. Three weeks have flown by since my last post on the trials and tribulations visited upon me by my calf muscle, and I have been lax in my blogging. Or perhaps more important things have pushed it down to the bottom the queue - you make the call.First of all, my leg is healing up nicely. It was relatively painful and inconvenient for two weeks, and then the pain and swelling subsided to almost nothing. My calf is still very tender if I rest it on the muscle, so I try to avoid doing that.
Patient - "Doctor, it hurts when I do this."Thankful for the near super-human healing capacity of my body, I decided that today was the day I would tempt fate and go surfing again. I rationalized that the calves don't get too much work while surfing, as it is mostly an upper-body type of activity.
Doctor - "Then don't do it!"
The water was extremely nice, and I surfed well for having been dry docked for the last three weeks. I didn't tweak my leg in the least bit, so I am officially not a lazy slob any more. Or so I claim.
What else has been going on? Well, all three kids are in soccer, which results in six practices per week over four days (we get Fridays off for good behavior, I guess) and three games on Saturday. Yes, my wife and I are very busy. Yes, we enjoy watching the kids practice and play. Yes, it is all good.
We also went on vacation several weeks ago, up to the Mammoth Lakes area. Once again, I know I am derelict in my duties, and will try and get some pictures up sometime in the next week or so.
Amy,
ReplyDeleteThanks for your response. Calf is feeling much better. Have a bigger problem to deal with now. Slipped on a wet garage floor and broke my wrist. Have to have surgery so won't be able to blog back for awhile. Best of luck to everyone with a calf injury. My new ID is now "Ms Accident Prone". ; )
Hi,
ReplyDeleteThanks Alan very much for this forum and thanks to everyone that has contributed. I am very grateful for the information and the chance it gives us to self diagnose our own personal sports injuries. While I can agree that seeing a specialist might at times be the only course of action, sometimes hearing from others inflicted with similar symptoms can be comforting as well as informative.
I am a 54yr old male in very good shape. During the winter months I ski at a competitive level in the moguls at about 100 days (1-2 hrs) per year. The last 1.5 years have not been as good as most and I have suffered through an ACL injury, a groin injury, some kind of debilitating patella discomfort, and now this calf thing.
Yes I am questioning the sanity of competing at this level yet the rewards still, by a decreasing amount, outweigh the pain and suffering.
I am six days into this incident. I was training in my winter sport three days before a major competition. Although we have been having a record amount of snowfall this year the snow pack is receding. I hooked the top of a bush with my right ski, this stopped the ski and spun me backwards as I continued down the steep run. I tumbled and twisted and bounced headfirst, backside down for a while. As I stopped and collected myself I found that unfamiliar to me pain that everyone talks about in the back of my right leg. I was hurting pretty bad. I was able to traverse out of the area and eventually get back down the mountain to my truck. Getting the ski boot off, driving home and getting up the stairs to the house was quite an ordeal. I did the RICE thing during that night and the pain was significantly less by the morning.
I am suffering with all of the similar things that others do... swelling, tenderness, cannot walk properly, pain much worse after sitting for awhile. The Thompson Test, squeezing of the calf while observing the foot produces the effect of a ruptured Achilles yet I don’t have the other symptoms of a rolled up tendon or an obvious space between the tendon. I can also with much pain raise up on the toes of the injured leg. This seems to eliminate the chance of an ATR and leans towards a calf muscle injury. Part of the pain is in a place that I cannot get to and makes me believe that likely I am suffering with some grade of Soleus tear.
Over the six days since the accident the pain is much more manageable and I can get around with an obvious limp. Today I have noticed a distinct yellowing of the skin on one side of the lower leg in the calf area. Doing small and careful stretching exercises I can produce a lot of pain pulling the toes up towards the body or pointing the toes towards the other foot. Moving the toes down from the body or opposite the other leg produces very little pain.
I am just going to let this play out and see what happens. I do have help from a girlfriend who has knowledge in PT. If anyone has an interest I will post again as this injury plays itself along.
Don H