Well – many of you know I had a pretty bad back spasm in May. I couldn’t walk for a week {pushed around the airport in a wheel chair), for two weeks I had minimal function then I just hit a point that I never really got any better. As much as I tried to ignore it and just keep climbing things started getting worse – pain was now going down my leg. Ok I stopped climbing and went to the doctor and started seeing physical therapists. Basically a bulging/herniated disk is pushing up against the nerves that run down the leg. Gotta get the pressure off by reducing the bulge and re-centering the disk. The pictures here are slices of the spine from the side and one from below, looking up the spine.
I don’t sit down anymore. 18 hrs a day, every day is on my feet or laying down. CPU at work is raised so I work on my feet. Now I’m doing three exercises to gradually get the thing back: back extensions, twists, and hip side movement.
The extension slightly moves the disk forward each time. So I do this 10 times every two hours. I also do 10 standing versions every two hours.
The twist actually shrinks the disk radially since the fibers of the disk rotate around the core. Two long holds every two hours.
The third is where I lean against the wall at my side, then push the hip into the wall. 2x every two hours.
After 3.5 months of this garbage – I asked the doc “can I climb if it’s just painfull or will it make things worse?” He said – it’s ok – take it easy – the only risk is re-rupturing, but pain doesn’t necessarily make it worse. So I went climbing… sort of. 20 minutes of slow walking to warm up. The exercises above. Then 30 minutes of really easy traversing – basically the most difficult thing I could do without increasing pain. Not exactly climbing. More like boring grandma-movement under the ruse of a highly athletic sport. Not climbing… I’ll call it “Gramming”.
My steroid shot is Monday – that’s supposed to reduce inflammation and therefore reduce pain.
A few things I’ve learned:
1. Taking really good care of finger/hand/elbow tendons is good for climbing – but not the only thing to pay attention to. Back exercises will be a permanent part of my climbing training.
2. Strong abs make for tight abs, which bends the spine forward, creating more pressure on the disk to jump out toward the nerve. Strong abs: good. Not stretching them regularly: bad.
3. When something goes wrong, persist with doctors, Physical Therapists etc to get all the help you need asap. Poor doctor advice up front caused this to last much longer. Appointments take time. I called every day to push up appointments shrinking the time from visit to steroid injection from 2 months to 3 weeks.
4. Yes, Ibuprofen is not great on your kidney. But you have to be on it for many many months before it’s a big deal. The benefit of reduced inflammation is far greater than the potential detriment with Kidney’s over a period of a couple months. I started taking 800 mg 3-4x a day for a month and was happy I did.
5. Everybody will offer you advice. Take it into consideration but trust the professionals. I’m pretty sure salt baths would not help me in this case. Stupid hippies.
Moral of the story: Don’t get hurt. But if you do, take it seriously and get LOTS of advice from qualified people.
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