One of the things that my OT has me working on is a series of exercises that build my extender muscles in my fingers. She alluded to the fact that my reflexers are rather strong, but my extenders are a little on the weak side. Therefore, I assume, that is why my hand feels fatigued after using the mouse. I remember in Scott Tennet’s book: Pumping Nylon, he mentioned something about this idea playing a part in right hand technique. I was curious enough to look it up. This is what I found:

Practicing rasguedos [that fancy flamenco technique where fingers whip across the strings with the back of the nails for a fast percussive effect] develops the extensor muscles, which are the muscles that move the fingers outward, away from the palm. Many players believe that playing scales with considerable speed and accuracy is dependent upon how quickly we can move our fingers out, not in. This would certainly explain why most flamenco guitarist have the ability to play blazingly fast scales.

If I had only practiced my rasguedos…

This whole process has been an extraordinary learning experience. I have a very intuitive sensibility when it comes to taking care of my hands, but I found that it was completely useless in the situation I was in. Just because I “felt” that my hand should be in a certain position doesn’t mean it’s right. Learning about what a healthy hand needs to be strong has been very comforting. When I put some intellect into the matter, I usually can work my way out of the problem.

Over the past 8 weeks of Physical Therapy, I’ve made some remarkable improvements. I used to feel like my shoulder was being ripped out when I would play guitar or drive a car. I aslo used to get a strong burning senseation in my forearm. It was like one my nerves was on fire. With an initial rest period, then exercises and stretches for muscle development, I think I’ve pretty much put my injury in check. I’ve become very sesitive to the warning signs of an entraped nerve and have several options I can use to get out of pain. Working with 2 Neurologists & an Occupational Therapist has helped me become more educated about what’s going on between my shoulder and my arm, and also from my brain to my fingers. That’s so very important to me.

When I look back at what I was doing it seems like a silly injury. I was out of shape and I was leaning on one of my nerves while I worked. Who wouldn’t be in pain after that?

I’m very gratefull for my injury. It helped me slow down and work more efficently. It helped me understand the importance of exericise and balance. These are all good principles that I’ve known, but I couldn’t put them into action until I was in some serious pain and in a threat state for an even worse perdiciment. It’s the leverage of not being able to play again that gave me inspiration to take care of what I have. No wonder Django was so good.

Sometimes holding the newspaper or picking up a coffee cup feels weird. Most of the time this doesn’t affect my guitar playing, but sometimes it does.

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I had a rough week last week and I had to cool down my computer activity so that I would be able to play a four-hour gig on Friday. The gig went fine. My hands were fine. It was almost like they were built for playing guitar. Saturday went well, but then today I started working on the computer, and Bam!, within 5 minutes my hand was numb.

I usually get frustrated when my hand gets numb, but this time I was furious. I was tired of managing my pain with withdraw. So I sat up, took note of my posture and then watched my hand as it worked the mouse. My hand was relatively stable. Most of the work was with my index & middle finger. I couldn’t understand why my ring & pinky were going numb. Then, I noticed where I was resting my wrist. I was pivoting my right wrist off the bottom right corner, and if you look at the illustration above, guess what nerve runs down that way? I looked at the bottom part of my hand and for the first time, I noticed a callous on that area. I’ve worked that area so hard that I’ve hardened the skin. What a fool am I.

After some ice packs and a couple of hours to mentally cool down, I am feeling good about my situation. Hopefully this is the last piece of my nervous system breakdown puzzle.

Right now I’m using a cushion to rest my wrist on as I type & use the mouse. I’ve got a PT appointment tomorrow. We’ll see what my OT says….

After a few days of pain I went to the doctor. My Neurologist diagnosed me with 2 pinched nerves: one in my shoulder and one in my elbow. She sent me for a MRI to examine my neck bones and for an EMG to check my nerve conduction. She also gave me a prescription for Physical Therapy.

My tests turned out normal. I had a couple of bone spurs in my neck, but I did not need surgery. My nerve conduction test (an EMG is a test where they electrocute you and then see how long it take for my hand to convulse) was totally normal.

The prognosis I kept hearing was that I had a bit of an overuse syndrome. Too much of something pushed me over the edge.

My physical therapy has been wonderful. We started off just working on healing the irritated area. I had to work a lot less, do plenty of stretching and spend time with a heating pad. I also had to sleep with an arm splint and a neck brace.

The second step in PT was to increase my strength. I’m 6’5” and not very muscularly developed. I have to look down at much of the world and tend to have curved shoulders in average posture. The strength training exercises were designed to build the muscles in my back that pull my shoulders straight. With a mixture of these exercises and kinesio tape , I really started to see a change my in condition.

Right now I’m mostly on the other side of the injury. If I really push things, do to much computer stuff, or don’t do my exercises, then the pain & numbness come back. All in all, is a good reason to get & stay in shape. I do need my body to play guitar.