Tuesday, April 13, 2010

I'm Bone Dunked

Well, it's been just over a month since the shin bone collision that's slowed my progress. The X-ray turned up negative, the weird bump is slowly going down since I've been rubbing it several times a day, and aside from some discoloration the first week there's been no outwardly physical signs of damage. I spoke with the training staff and they conclude, since the X-ray was negative, that the most likely culprit is a bone bruise. Confirmation of this diagnosis would require an MRI, but the last time I had that done it cost $300 and I'm not THAT curious.

"What can I do to speed up the healing?", I asked politely of the head trainer. "Jack", came her succinct response. "Can I injure it more by playing sports on it?", I inquired. "Nope" she eloquently answered. It takes anywhere from several months to a year for a bone bruise to heal completely. FUCK. THAT. I just got my body back into kickass shape, and now I'm laid up because of this suckass injury. Well, at least I know I can't make it worse by continuing to exercise.

I played my worst game of basketball last Friday morning, going 1-for-5 and turning the ball over twice. Awesome. My team lost all four games. I'm definitely not nearly as mobile, but having not shooting around in a month has really deteriorated whatever shot I thought I had. Sunday I played football and because of stupid leg got to be all-time QB and surprised myself, completing long and short passes regularly. I managed to suck it up and play receiver on a third of the plays and did well there too, although I couldn't start fast off the line as I couldn't push off my leg.

Today in the weight room I did my first squats at 150# and finally met a fail point! On my third set of 10, I could only do 6 reps. Ach! I'm not too worried however, as it was my first set on a new weight and I hadn't done lifting since Thursday previous. I'm confident this Thursday I can knock out the entire 3 sets of 10 at 150#. On cardio days I've been increasing my time as well, and on Monday I did 44 minutes on the Death Machine. Of course I would murder to be able to run outside - 75, sunny, no humidity - but this damnable leg won't let me.

So for now, I'm going to keep trying to play through on Friday basketball and Sunday football. The leg is s l o w l y feeling better, and I'm sure if I laid off the weekend sports it'd heal faster, but I just can't do it!! I'm also going to dedicate an ibuprofen routine, 400mg 3x a day, one glass of milk a day (strong bones!!), and icing the leg when I get home. With an estimated recovery of several months, I can't really gauge when I'll be 100% again... but the build-up of dunkness continues unabated! If I can keep this squat-weight increases up, by the end of the month I'll be squatting my body weight - how cool is that? I mean, for me?

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