Posted on Thursday, 19th March 2009 by Patrick Dorwin
Hi all, just wanted to bring those few of you following my broken arm/wrist saga, up to speed. At the crack of dawn tomorrow, it will be ten weeks since I slipped on the ice and basically crushed the end of one of the bones in my forearm where it joins the wrist (a Comminuted fracture of the distal radius). This was a bad break that took a steel plate and eleven screws to hold all of the small fragments of bone in place. The photo to the right is NOT my arm, but mine looks similar.
Those of you that follow my Twitter streams have learned a lot more about my recovery, especially my physical therapy. I am still surprised that such a tiny little girl like my therapist can inflict so much pain on me 
But over the past two months of therapy, I have made steady, although, what seems to me to be painfully (no pun intended) slow progress.
We jump ahead to today, I paid a visit to my surgeon, he was impressed that I had as much range of motion as I do, and he was a little surprised that I was doing as much as I am in therapy, but after X-rays, the mood was brought down. While there is a lot of new bone growth, there is one area where there is a sort of gap, and until this gap is closed, he will not allow me to return to work without weight restrictions. I will also have to keep wearing my wrist brace, or as I call it, my “constant companion.”
So, I get another month of therapy and, most frustrating, a limited work load. I was really hoping to be able to start working my way back into my normal work schedule. While I will be able to do a bit more, I am still limited to 40lbs. of lifting. Hopefully, after another month of increasing therapy, this gap on the bone growth will fill in and I will be able to get back to life, but that will be 14 weeks after a little patch of ice screwed up my life…
I have had another issue with this arm, we first thought it was all related to the fracture, but it seems that in the fall I also damaged my ulnar nerve (the funny bone). My last two fingers are still numb, a great improvement over all 5 being numb, but when i asked the doc today, he was surprised, because his surgery would not have effected the ulnar nerve side of the arm, and he now thinks that it may have been damaged, but covered by the more severe injury. He doesn’t think it will be a major issue, but we will watch it as time goes on.
So the frustration continues… frustration and pain and all the mess that goes with it…
~sigh~
Posted in Home | Comments (2) |
2 Responses to “A frustrating update on the busted paw”
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March 19th, 2009 at 7:11 pm
Socialized and Nationalized health care is what you need Patrick.
BTW, I’ve been there. (where you are) Godspeed my friend. Do what your Doctors and Therapists tell you. Godspeed Patrick.
March 19th, 2009 at 8:43 pm
Personally, I believe it’s irrefutable evidence you were shoplifting at Home Depot. There’s screws, and what appears to be a garden implement clearly pictured.