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Zorlee
12 Posts |
 Posted - 09/16/2008 : 15:35:09
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Hi everyone!
I'm a drummer, and as a drummer you use your hands. A lot!
A couple of years ago I started to get a little up-tight when I played gigs. Then one day, at a rehersal, I felt really weird in my right hand. "Hmm, I hope this isn't tendonitis", I thought.
I was gonna play a huge musical production that year, and therefore I checked up with a physician, just to make sure everything was okey.
Well, she told me that I had "a mild tendonitis"...
This made me extremely afraid, I was so scared! Drumming is a way of life for me, and I was scared to death to lose my ability to play the drums. Anyway - I stopped playing for a little while, and I thought to myself "Why only my right hand?", and I checked my left hand at the physician, and she said that it was a bit up-tight too...
The pain got worse, and worse...!
I stopped playing drums (torture!!) and tried everything to stop this "tendonitis" from developing into something they called "chronic tendonitis". Well, it got worse! Weeks went by, months, and my arms just felt terrible! I tried everything, and here's a little list of what I tried:
- Physician x 3
- Acupuncture
- Chiro
- Sports massage
- Cold bath therapy (or whatever it was called)
- Stretching / Strengthening programs (up to one hour a day of stretching!)
- Osteopath
- Reflexology
Well - long story short - my hands didn't improve one bit by any of the therapies listed above. On the other hand - the therapists told me a whole lot of things, including:
- Chronic Tendonitis in both hands
- Beginning of carpal tunnel syndrome
- That I could never be able to play drums again freely
1 year and 6 months later:
I was so depressed. It really hurts just to think about it. My life was getting up from bed, maybe some crying, then going to school without using my hands at all, going home to watch TV all day (I didn't have to use my arms for this! BUT I was actually afraid of using the remote, because of the buttons, so I usually watched movies! How sick is that!?) then go to sleep. I had no energy, and my mind was fixed on this one issue that made my life a living hell for me. I couldn't drum. I couldn't make music. I couldn't drive. I couldn't write. Nothing!!
Then one day, I searched for another miracle cure (none had helped in 1 1/2 years, so I was just looking for a little sign of hope I guess). Then I came across this article:
http://podolsky.everybody.org/rsi/
I got really frustrated at first, but I just had to read it. The story was good, and you know... You always look for a way out, when you're down.
I read it another time, and I started thinking:
What if I just started doing what I've always done? What if I just don't care?
I found out that I had two major issues:
- I was constantly afraid of the pain
- I was extremely afraid of not getting painfree ever again
I read up on this TMS thing, and I decided that I should give it a try! It couldn't get any worse, could it?
I bought an Xbox, and started playing (something I would've NEVER done before). It hurt, sometimes a lot. My hands were tingling and I didn't feel comfortable at all. But I thought to myself:
"I'm NOT afraid of the pain, and my goal is not to get painfree, but to get my life back. When I get my life back, I will probably get painfree"
That thought healed me. I started driving a little bit, started practising my drums for 20 minutes, started to exercise a little, and within a week I was painfree!
And I've been pain free since January 2008!! It's SO great, and I just LOVE IT!!!!
I haven't read anything other than Rachel's article and a couple of posts here on the TMShelp forum...
It's just a mental choice in the end - a really hard one, that is. Because you really have to not care about what your therapists say.
Personally, I really don't believe in tendonitis or carpal tunnel or whatever anymore. They told me over and over again that I had chronic tendonitis in both hands, and that it would take months, even years, to get well. WELL, it took me one week to get painfree.
That being said, I had to constantly remind myself:
"I'm NOT afraid of the pain, and my goal is not to get painfree, but to get my life back. When I get my life back, I will probably get painfree"
I hope that this might help a depressed soul out there, looking for hope. I know what you're going through, I know the constant pain - physically, and mentally!
Read up on the TMS info, and be strong! If I can do it, you can!
And please, ask questions if you have any!
Yours sincerely,
Zorlee |
Edited by - Zorlee on 09/16/2008 15:39:01 |
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celloLWF
USA
49 Posts |
Posted - 10/30/2008 : 22:11:40
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Your story was extremely similar to mine, except you can replace drums with "cello" and you get the picture. I also decided one day at my PT appointment I didn't care anymore...I was going to get out of the trap catch-22 situation of never getting better from tendonitis. Then i looked up Sarno's book after , GET THIS, my doctor finally recommended I read it. I knew about it from Rachel's RSI page and some other books I read about RSI, but I never thought the pyschological approach could be an end all approach. He was, afterall , the only person saying I could get 100% back to normal, and almost all his patients did. Why not give it a try....
poof, better in a week. It was like that scene at the end of the Matrix, when Neo looks around and suddenly he could see all the code running the illusion of his reality. I saw through the false information, and my hands became normal again.
And then I started playing cello again 3 hours a day and have never looked back. |
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