I'm Freeeee!
I went to the doctor for follow up x-rays yesterday, and I'm freeee! No more immobilizer unless I'm sleeping or at work! Collarbone is healing well, albeit super slow, as predicted. They said I'm doing everything I should be though, and I have good range of motion (hereafter referred to as ROM) given what happened and the short amount of time it's been (2.5 weeks). However, I have to up my ROM exercises from here on out, or I will end up with a frozen shoulder, which I am not okay with happening.
I was told to do as much as I can with it (without lifting anything or doing any sort of repetitive motions (think washing tables or walls)). I was also told that I'm going to feel pain and more than likely feel that bone grinding together (think two jagged ends of a stick and some large splinters all jammed together side by side - that's what the broken ends and fragments look like on the x-rays). According to them, that is normal and won't further damage it. Their biggest concern right now is ensuring that I don't do any lifting with that arm and that I'm getting enough ROM built back up in the coming weeks so that everything works properly when the bone is finally healed.
So it looks like that light pushing of the limits over the past week has paid off somewhat! The nurse looked mildly surprised when she asked me to lift my arm as high as I could and I got it almost as high as it is supposed to go (almost - not quite - and I hadn't pushed it anywhere near that far prior to the doctor's visit, so I was pretty surprised myself). Some motions still require assistance from my other hand to move my arm as far as it can go, but overall, it's not nearly as bad. And since I didn't have it in the immobilizer yesterday afternoon up until I went to bed and had been forcing myself to use it more when reaching for things, rather than use my good left arm, I could feel that it had loosened up somewhat already and was getting easier to move.
Here's to hoping I can rehab it on my own and get it healed and stronger as quick as possible so I can get back to doing everything I had wanted to be doing right now!
I was told to do as much as I can with it (without lifting anything or doing any sort of repetitive motions (think washing tables or walls)). I was also told that I'm going to feel pain and more than likely feel that bone grinding together (think two jagged ends of a stick and some large splinters all jammed together side by side - that's what the broken ends and fragments look like on the x-rays). According to them, that is normal and won't further damage it. Their biggest concern right now is ensuring that I don't do any lifting with that arm and that I'm getting enough ROM built back up in the coming weeks so that everything works properly when the bone is finally healed.
So it looks like that light pushing of the limits over the past week has paid off somewhat! The nurse looked mildly surprised when she asked me to lift my arm as high as I could and I got it almost as high as it is supposed to go (almost - not quite - and I hadn't pushed it anywhere near that far prior to the doctor's visit, so I was pretty surprised myself). Some motions still require assistance from my other hand to move my arm as far as it can go, but overall, it's not nearly as bad. And since I didn't have it in the immobilizer yesterday afternoon up until I went to bed and had been forcing myself to use it more when reaching for things, rather than use my good left arm, I could feel that it had loosened up somewhat already and was getting easier to move.
Here's to hoping I can rehab it on my own and get it healed and stronger as quick as possible so I can get back to doing everything I had wanted to be doing right now!
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