It happened at the end of my workout on the third rep of my final set. I heard the pop, felt the snap and dropped the weights in both of my hands.
Shook my head with disbelief, stood up and looked at my left arm.
For a moment I let it dangle at my side and then as I felt it begin to swell I started to move it. I wanted to test my range of motion and having dislocated or jammed multiple fingers figured I would take the lessons I learned from there.
Some movement was important as it would keep it from getting too stiff.
Is It A Mutiny or Just Aging
Stood up, reached my left arm across my body, hand gripping my right shoulder. Took a moment to use my right arm to take the weights off of the machine and replace them on their stand.
Turned and walked towards the door lost in thought about whether my arm had chosen to engage in mutiny or if this was just aging.
The plan wasn’t to write any more about that four day hospital stay last October. It’s Hard To Run With An IV In Your Arm Part 3 was supposed to be the final commentary on the joy of an unplanned and unwanted ambulance trip.
But here we are, far too close to that moment and there is a healthy dose of irritation and anger. The point of working out wasn’t to get injured but to prepare the body to enter the second half of life.
To build a body that is ready for whatever comes and capable of allowing me to take care of myself until the day I can’t do so any longer.
I didn’t wrestle the Angel of Death in October for an opportunity to go under the knife again but life doesn’t care what your preferences are.
So tomorrow afternoon the surgeon is going to cut open my left arm, clean up the frayed end of the tendon I tore and reattach it to the bone.
If I am lucky the doc will make it a bionic arm and or throw in some Adamantium. Or if I am really lucky I’ll get a dose of Super Soldier Serum and then I can tell my friend Mitch to call me Steve Rogers.
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Someone asked if I am nervous to go into surgery again and I shrugged my shoulders. I don’t like it and I prefer not to do it, but this isn’t an uncommon situation.
More than a few athletes have been through this and the surgery isn’t particularly long. They tell me I’ll get about two weeks in a sling and then a chunk of time in a brace.
Somewhere around 90 days or so from now I’ll be given the green light to start lifting heavier things with my left arm again.
I have plans for the interim that start with trying to figure out how to dress myself and do basic stuff with one arm.
Figure on my doing some kind of lifting with my right arm so I maintain things there and time on the treadmill or walking.
Intermixed with that I suppose I may have to learn how to ask for help a little bit which will chap my hide a bit cuz I love my independence.
Be Kind To Yourself
Got things to do to prepare for what is to come and so this post will be relatively short. One of the things I am doing is making a not to be kind to myself.
There is no bigger critic of me than me and there are moments when I am irritated that all of the hard work I put in led to this.
Moments where I replay the incident and ask myself if I am not to blame because the tendon tore after I threw another 25 pounds on each side.
But then I remember I have adjusted multiple aspects of my workout to be more in line with my age and the almost 57 years of wear and tear.
There is no way to plan for this and I had no warning it was coming. I have followed my plan to live hard and love hard.
Sometimes things happen and though this is irritating it is just one more step on the hero’s journey so we’ll keep going.
The adventure continues, the story isn’t yet complete.
See you on the other side.
If you want to read more click here and don’t forget to use the six million dollar man sound effect. I’ll be thinking of it as they put me out.
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