Exercising with an injury, need ideas!

LTKeegan

So I'm usually really active, I aim for Crossfit or the boxing my crossfit gym offers 1-2x per week and rock climbing 3-5 times per week. But I have a problem. (You can skip to "ANYWAYS" if you don't want to read about the injury)


Long story, (I'll try to shorten it) I was mountaineering over Christmas break and the boots I was wearing changed my gait from sort of rocking and pushing off your toes to lifting my foot straight up. So normally when you walk you use the muscles around your knees and since I changed my gait I was using my hip flexors too much and I strained them. And evidently made my thighs really tight too, so did some damage there.

I've been going to massage and physio for that and things were getting better, then climbing the other night, my inner thigh muscle started spasming and then just tightened up. A day later my low back was hurting and two days later my WHOLE back was hurting. UGH.


I went to massage yesterday and I was told I had over worked my already sore inner thigh (groin) muscle and it tightened up to protect itself, but because that side of me was so sore, it was pulling on my pelvis, which then made my low back on the OTHER side over work, and tighten (the massage therapist actually laughed at how tight this muscle was) and that pulled on I think its called the erector spinase (?) the muscle that runs parallel to your spine, which caused the upper back pain.


ANYWAYS, I was told "it would be best if you AT LEAST take the weekend off from climbing or squatting or any other quad intensive exercise". So what the hell do I do? Even sit ups use your hip flexors!!


My normal activities are: rock climbing, crossfit, kickboxing and cycling. I'd like to get SOME sort of burn in but I'm not sure what TO do? Yoga?

Help!!


PS. I don't have a lot of money, so free things I can do in my house would be the best

cpusmc

take the weekend off. heck, take a week off. nothing bad will happen in that week. and the good that will come will ensure you can get back to your normal training program that much faster. i screwed around trying to work through a partially torn tricep tendon and it extended my recovery time another month. learned my lesson. now that minute i feel an injury, i.e. recently tweaked my hamstring doing squats, i shut it down and rest that muscle group for at least a week and then when i return start back light and work my way back to heavy over a period of time. body needs that rest and a weekend at least wont cause any issues...

if you just cant do that, try a pushup/pullup circuit, upper body based and little leg involvement.

good luck...

LTKeegan

take the weekend off. heck, take a week off.

But what will I DO?!? What do people do when their social activity is going to the gym?! haha


You're probably right.

jimmmer

take the weekend off. heck, take a week off.

But what will I DO?!? What do people do when their social activity is going to the gym?! haha


You're probably right.

Kick back, enjoy some brews with mates... go out for a nice meal somewhere with some good company... go to the cinema and catch a film you've been meaning to see... read a book... chill with some tunes... etc... etc... plenty of things to do.

Your fitness won't evaporate overnight by taking a break and healing. Most people find the opposite actually: a short, enforced break from training stops people from doing their current overtrained schedule and actually allows for some gains as you finally allow your body a chance to adapt.

yo_andi

So I'm usually really active, I aim for Crossfit or the boxing my crossfit gym offers 1-2x per week and rock climbing 3-5 times per week. But I have a problem. (You can skip to "ANYWAYS" if you don't want to read about the injury)


Long story, (I'll try to shorten it) I was mountaineering over Christmas break and the boots I was wearing changed my gait from sort of rocking and pushing off your toes to lifting my foot straight up. So normally when you walk you use the muscles around your knees and since I changed my gait I was using my hip flexors too much and I strained them. And evidently made my thighs really tight too, so did some damage there.

I've been going to massage and physio for that and things were getting better, then climbing the other night, my inner thigh muscle started spasming and then just tightened up. A day later my low back was hurting and two days later my WHOLE back was hurting. UGH.


I went to massage yesterday and I was told I had over worked my already sore inner thigh (groin) muscle and it tightened up to protect itself, but because that side of me was so sore, it was pulling on my pelvis, which then made my low back on the OTHER side over work, and tighten (the massage therapist actually laughed at how tight this muscle was) and that pulled on I think its called the erector spinase (?) the muscle that runs parallel to your spine, which caused the upper back pain.


ANYWAYS, I was told "it would be best if you AT LEAST take the weekend off from climbing or squatting or any other quad intensive exercise". So what the hell do I do? Even sit ups use your hip flexors!!


My normal activities are: rock climbing, crossfit, kickboxing and cycling. I'd like to get SOME sort of burn in but I'm not sure what TO do? Yoga?

Help!!


PS. I don't have a lot of money, so free things I can do in my house would be the best

Take a week off. Seriously. You are injured and from what it sounds like, pretty badly so. You can do light yoga if you want but with strained hip flexors be careful of a lot of deeper stretches. You'll come back stronger and rearing to go!

TR0berts

Definitely NOT yoga. Not if you're having leg issues.


Seriously - take time off. Your body needs to heal. If you're having a hard time thinking about it, ask yourself: would you rather take a few days off, or hurt yourself more, so that you need several weeks (maybe months) off?

LTKeegan

take the weekend off. heck, take a week off.

But what will I DO?!? What do people do when their social activity is going to the gym?! haha


You're probably right.

Kick back, enjoy some brews with mates... go out for a nice meal somewhere with some good company... go to the cinema and catch a film you've been meaning to see... read a book... chill with some tunes... etc... etc... plenty of things to do.

Your fitness won't evaporate overnight by taking a break and healing. Most people find the opposite actually: a short, enforced break from training stops people from doing their current overtrained schedule and actually allows for some gains as you finally allow your body a chance to adapt.

Thanks I appreciate your suggestions, I think I'm doing sushi and girls night tonight, which should alleviate some boredom

I'm not worried about losing my fitness, I'm worried about being bored. My boyfriend and all of my good friend are climbers, and I've already gotten 2 texts about climbing this weekend

JustinAnimal

I know what you mean. I have a (very minor, yet serious) leg injury right now and the not exercising (no intervals, no running, no squats, lunges, step-ups, deadlifts, aerobic tapes) is driving me crazy. I finally started going to the gym and getting my burn with fairly serious back / chest / abs / arms circuit training, which at least made me feel less lazy. I say do what you can, while not doing any further harm to your injury.

But, seriously, rest. I've been much better about RICE (at least the icing and elevating part), because I'm damn sick of sitting around while my wife runs every day in this nice weather.

LTKeegan

Definitely NOT yoga. Not if you're having leg issues.


Seriously - take time off. Your body needs to heal. If you're having a hard time thinking about it, ask yourself: would you rather take a few days off, or hurt yourself more, so that you need several weeks (maybe months) off?

Can you explain why definitely not?

I won't do it, I'm just wondering why yoga specifically is bad (unless its just as bad as everything else and you are just trying to tell me to chill).



You all have convinced me to chill until my next appointment.

a_stronger_me13

If you CrossFit, don't you have access to a coach? I would talk to them or a PT or a doctor about ways to work around your injury.

I wish so hard that I would've done this when I injured my back and shoulder. Instead I threw a temper tantrum, stopped working out and ate more because I felt sorry for myself.

ETA: If a specialist tells you to rest and take time off, do it. They know what they're talking about.

LTKeegan

I know what you mean. I have a (very minor, yet serious) leg injury right now and the not exercising (no intervals, no running, no squats, lunges, step-ups, deadlifts, aerobic tapes) is driving me crazy. I finally started going to the gym and getting my burn with fairly serious back / chest / abs / arms circuit training, which at least made me feel less lazy. I say do what you can, while not doing any further harm to your injury.

But, seriously, rest. I've been much better about RICE (at least the icing and elevating part), because I'm damn sick of sitting around while my wife runs every day in this nice weather.

For me its heat, not ice. I don't have injured muscles, just really tight ones (...I think...) Also, nice weather? its been -30 here

LTKeegan

If you CrossFit, don't you have access to a coach? I would talk to them or a PT or a doctor about ways to work around your injury.

I wish so hard that I would've done this when I injured my back and shoulder. Instead I threw a temper tantrum, stopped working out and ate more because I felt sorry for myself.

I do, I don't usually go to crossfit on the weekends because all the classes are early in the morning and I am not a morning person, but I will ask on Monday if I go. You are correct, they are super helpful.

TR0berts

Definitely NOT yoga. Not if you're having leg issues.


Seriously - take time off. Your body needs to heal. If you're having a hard time thinking about it, ask yourself: would you rather take a few days off, or hurt yourself more, so that you need several weeks (maybe months) off?

Can you explain why definitely not?

I won't do it, I'm just wondering why yoga specifically is bad (unless its just as bad as everything else and you are just trying to tell me to chill).



You all have convinced me to chill until my next appointment.

Yoga requires quite a bit of strength and flexibility. You will likely make the problem worse by not resting things. If things are truly just tight, then the stretching may be OK, but the strength component of yoga probably wouldn't help things.

As such, I guess I should emend my previous statement to: definitely not any strength-bearing yoga.

212019156

I would rest it. Don't mess with your back. IF your back goes down you go down.

LTKeegan

Definitely NOT yoga. Not if you're having leg issues.


Seriously - take time off. Your body needs to heal. If you're having a hard time thinking about it, ask yourself: would you rather take a few days off, or hurt yourself more, so that you need several weeks (maybe months) off?

Can you explain why definitely not?

I won't do it, I'm just wondering why yoga specifically is bad (unless its just as bad as everything else and you are just trying to tell me to chill).



You all have convinced me to chill until my next appointment.

Yoga requires quite a bit of strength and flexibility. You will likely make the problem worse by not resting things. If things are truly just tight, then the stretching may be OK, but the strength component of yoga probably wouldn't help things.

As such, I guess I should emend my previous statement to: definitely not any strength-bearing yoga.

Ok. I was imagining some gentle stretching yoga and couldn't figure out why it would be bad. Yeah, and intense yoga practice would be a bad idea. Thanks for clarifying

Marcia315

do you have access to a pool at the gym?

LTKeegan

do you have access to a pool at the gym?

I do actually! Thats a really good idea! I should see when open swim times are!