No pain no gain 越戰越強

My road to recovery from an A2 pulley rupture.

The inevitable to climbers happened to me on 1st May 2021. There was no signs of it coming, there was absolutely no symptoms or any discomfort on any of my fingers all this while, yet I made a "fatal" wrong decision to tweak a maximum two-finger pocket reach from a static move (which I managed to executive more than 50% of the time), to a more dynamic move that has caused a sudden load which was far greater than what my fingers were built up for.

POP goes my A2 pulley on my wedding band finger.

There was an onset discomfort, but I would not call that pain. But it was more the POP that got me alarmed and decided to let go of my hands and taken a fall. Instantly I knew it was my pulley (thank goodness to the time investment in reading up on climbing 101), so I knew I should not carry on.

Exactly as most climbers described, there was not much pain, just soreness and stiffness. I could still bend and make a fist but the brain knew something is gone. I was feeling ill at ease, but I was fortunate to be surrounded by the familiar voices: thank you to my husband, my training partner, and my belayer who were there to tell me that it is going to be okay.

However it was until a few hours later, this trauma set in. I started crying with my body felt like jelly, not because I was worried about not being able to climb again (as I have read many successful recovery stories), but the terrifying feeling of finally acknowledging that a piece of "me" is broken!!! Guilt and fear lingered on for a while. A hot shower and reading up plenty of articles about what it is and how to recover from it, had slowly got some calmness and composure back in the soul.

The rest is history.

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During the first week of complete rest, I have seen a specialist to confirm the injury (full rupture) and I have covered a lot of grounds on youtube videos and research works on soft tissue recovery. With all these new acquired knowledge on injury management, I have put together an 86-day recovery plan.

As I write about this, I am exactly 10% into the plan and today I finally get to start the level 1 retraining exercise with active range of motion and palm crimps. I allowed myself to sulk for the first few days, the above has redirected my focus and helped occupied my mind with productive thoughts and actions. I think this is going to be one of the critical success factors for a 100% recovery.

It is uncanny how the country's third movement control order started three days after my injury, making no climbing that much more easier to deal with. Thank you for looking after me. With this, I feel I have not lost anything from this injury but gained a lot more knowledge, that will enable me to manage my climbing "career" with that much more sensibility and maturity. During the banter with my training partner, I said from now on I will watch my health expenses with a "Tendon Budget" which will be guided by the Double-7 rules. One the budget fully spent, wait 48 to 72 hours for the tendon budget to be renewed before you can happily, healthily, spend away again.

Patience and Perseverance until 26th July! Allez!!!

Roads to full recovery...