Wrist pain

nowherefast · Post by **nowherefast** » March 5th, 2007, 3:14 pm

My left wrist gives me great pain whenever I have to rotate it from palms down ninety degrees to palm facing in. It started Friday after a lifting session. I took a day off and did a thirty minute pain-free row yesterday. Today I did a 5K w/o pain but when I moved to my DYNO to lift I got a sharp shooting pain that immediately terminated the workout (and that never happens). I've got it wrapped in a wrist brace now but boy does it hurt! Any ideas what it might be? It does not appear swollen. If it keeps up I'll see a doc but I'd like some idea what I might be up against. Thanks all.

johnlvs2run · Post by **johnlvs2run** » March 5th, 2007, 5:12 pm

You're probably putting way too much pressure on your wrists.

Keep soaking your wrists in cold water with a tray of ice cubes and do this 4 or 5 times a day till they're healed. At the beginning you won't be able to tolerate the cold because of the heat and inflammation in your wrists. As you can leave your wrists in the cold ice water longer, this is a sign of their healing. As your wrist is healing, move it around in different positions when it's numb. This helps the cold to go deep to promote healing. When you can leave the injured wrist in for 10:00 at least a couple times a day then it should be just about healed.

Be sure you are eliminating the cause of the injury. You might be jerking the handle on the erg when you're rowing, especially at low rates. Be sure you are not jerking the handle. Instead of this, apply the pressure gradually and evenly at the catch. Avoid using heat.

Let me know how this works for you.

My wrists were injured a couple times doing Olympic lifting in my 20's, and the ice water quickly got me back on track.

Nosmo · Post by **Nosmo** » March 27th, 2007, 1:35 pm

Careful with the wrist brace. It will help for a while, but use for too long can result in weakend muscles and worse problems down the road. If this has been going on for two years, it is serious so you have to be very disciplend about taking care of it. First of all find exercises that do not hurt you wrist and stay away from anything that might hurt it. Unless you've already done permante damage your wrist should heal if you don't stress them out. However learning not to hurt them can be extreemly difficult.
Do you use a computer much? Does your wrist bother you when you do?

nowherefast · Post by **nowherefast** » May 30th, 2007, 6:17 pm

Just to close the loop, thanks to all for your advice. As usual, the best advice is rest, which most of us avoid. Fortunately I developed a heavy cold to go with the injured wrist. This resulted in a three week lay off. I rowed/DYNOed the next three weeks(after the lay off) with a wrist band. I've been rowing wrist pain and wrist band free since. (the ice and ibuprofen helped initially with symptoms but rest was critical).