Many of you may already know this but I had to have surgery on my wrist on the 12th of last month. When I was a freshman in high school, almost 6 years ago, I fractured my wrist playing basketball. I remember the moment when it happened like it was yesterday, because it was the most excruciating pain that went up my arm. My teammate threw the ball at me and when I went to catch it, it pushed my hand farther back than it's supposed to go. Way farther in all actuality because it had fractured my wrist! I remember grabbing my wrist hard and applying an extreme amount of pressure, however everyone told me I was overreacting and that I would be perfectly fine if I go home and ice it. So that's what I did, I finished practice, went home and iced it and then the next day I went out and bought a brace for it.
I tried to wear the brace for as long as I could but not surprisingly my classmates all harassed me for it and spread rumors about having a brace on my hand because of inappropriate things I won't get into because this is a family friendly blog! Well, after that I stopped wearing it. Obviously, who wouldn't? Maybe not most people, but I was tired of hearing the sad, pathetic jokes from everyone. So I went on to forget about it. I have always had pain in my wrist since it happened but I chose to ignore it so I wouldn't have to hear about what others had to say. I wasn't able to put pressure on my wrist or bend it at an angle without causing a lot of pain.
One day my coworker Eli, told me that wasn't normal and that I needed to go get it looked at. I tried hard to talk myself out of it because it had been 5-6 years, its fine now right? I had become used to living this way so why go and change it? Well, I ended up going anyways because I was curious on what was going on and if my wrist was ACTUALLY fractured.
Turns out to my luck it was! My doctor was completely stunned I had gone that long without coming in. I went into surgery immediately the next week. I was terrified because I knew not only was I getting surgery to fix my wrist, but along with that comes months of casts, braces, pain, stiffness, physical therapy, and not being able to use my wrist at all. The thought of it is honestly depressing.
Well, I had my surgery and it went very well. Although the only good thing about it was the drugs, everything else sucked. I was placed in a soft cast for about 2 weeks and then afterwards I got my hard cast...
Which may I add was absolutely horrible to have. I had to wear this for 4 weeks and the whole 4 weeks were filled with nothing but annoyance, pain, itchiness, and having to shower with a giant bag on my arm.
After 4 weeks of the cast I FINALLY got it removed yesterday! My wrist has finally healed and is now ready for a brace. I am so excited that I no longer have to wear a cast and I can take a shower without a giant bag on my arm!
I am still in a lot of pain and I have very limited movement to my wrist but I am slowly but surely going to get better! I will be able to start physical therapy in 2 weeks and will begin the long road ahead to stretching and gaining strength back in my wrist.
The moral I can give out of this story of my life is to listen to your gut instinct, don't let others cloud your judgment when you know deep down what needs to be done. The others around you cannot possibly know how you are feeling and what is going on inside, so no matter what anyone tells you follow what you think.
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