11:57 PM
I'm mostly recovered now from the back injury. One thing I learned is that no one cares. I mean it's not like I went out or told anyone either, just two people, but they didn't really care that much either. For me, I just don't like making a big deal out of anything, so I keep a lot to myself.
It's been about 3-4 days since my deadlifting back injury, and I'm mostly recovered now. Some improvements from yesterday is that I can now sit and stand up without touching my knees and without feeling much pain. Yesterday, I could sit and stand, and I'd do 10 reps of sitting and standing as PT (physical therapy) but there was some pain, and I had to hold my knees and push up from it to stand.
Today there was still some discomfort, and still some pain in regards to sitting and then standing up, but it was mostly easy now. I took sitting and standing up for granted, as something we all can just do and easily too. Well, the back is apparently extremely important for all movement, getting it injured means you can't do even basic things as easily anymore.
Even crawling the other night actually hurt a lot. Everything was so difficult. Yet I just kept pushing through the pain and doing PT (physical therapy) as that's what was recommended from weightlifters who have suffered through it before. I wrote a bit about my experience, but I could have written so much more. I can't describe how incredibly hard and painful it was to even move.
I'm just going to post the experience of what some other people had. Here's one person:
"I jacked up my back horribly earlier after reracking a barbell for warmup sets... My back locked up and I'm literally bed ridden, can't walk or even get up without sharp pain. I literally feel crippled but I've been through this here and there before...
I was bed ridden for at least 3 days, had trouble to get out of bed to even shit. Needed a cane once I was able to barely get out of bed and even then too weak to go more than 10ft. By day 4 I had more mobility and was walking by Day 5 or 6. A heating pad seemed to help immensely. Was totally normal after a week.
I probably should have seen a PT but I think what contributed to whatever happened was my weak core & glutes"
I'm so glad I didn't experience it as badly as this guy did. He's says he's fine now after a week, but being bedridden is seriously an example of bad it could be. The thing is, I don't know if what I experienced was any worse than this guy's, and that I just fared better. It seems pretty arrogant to say, but I think I would have been bedridden too if I didn't force myself to get up, taking 2-5 minutes to stand, and then crawling or leaning on the wall to move.
No one is home with me to take care of me or anything, so I have to get my own water, stand up to use the bathroom myself, and do everything myself. I actually had such a hard time getting up, that I considered... well, it might be TMI to say. Let's just say it's bathroom related.
I really didn't know what it felt like to be bedridden until I experienced it myself. There was no way to stand up at all. Physically, my appearance looked fine, no visible injuries or anything, but I couldn't move, I couldn't stand up, I couldn't sit, I couldn't do anything without extreme effort.
The other day I said that it felt like doing a single leg raise was impossible. I physically could not do it. I've done thousands of times, so I know how to do it, but it was literally impossible. A leg raise is lying down flat on your back, feet together, and then raising your legs and feet vertically up without bending, until it reaches your waist at a 90 degree angle. I want to describe how "impossible" felt.
I can surprisingly do leg raises now. It is hard, but not impossible anymore. Yesterday, when I tried, I would physically hear ringing, a really high pitched tone that deafened everything, and it felt extremely painful on my back. There's a fan in my room and it's pretty loud. Whenever I'd attempt a leg raise, all noise disappeared and the only thing I could hear was this ringing. I'm not joking. It's like how having a toothache also deafens your ears a bit, attempting a leg raise deafened both ears and it was so painful.
Also there's this guy's experience:
"Been in chronic pain since May 2022 because of a deadlift. 2 MRI scans later and degenerative discs, 2x lumbar disc bulges, and an annular fissure... Haven't lifted since, and are in constant pain every day"
Yeah. This can be extremely serious. I think I'm going to go extremely, extremely slowly on deadlifts from now on. I'm going to do extremely light weights, and only increase the weigh by like, 5 pounds every 3 sessions. Previously I'd add 5 pounds after every session. Now I'm going to add 5 pounds every 3 sessions, then maybe take it slower and slower after that.
"I was getting worried, night one I couldn’t move without what felt like a 10 on the pain scale ripping across my lower back, my GF had to get a cup so I could pee as even moving an inch caused excruciating pain that made me think I was going to pass out, day 2 was 20-30% better, I could very slowly stand up with lots of assistance still came very close to blacking out, day 3 I could stand up on my own and walk to the toilet, today is day 4 and while I am still in a lot of pain I can actually get up and move around on my own. I’ve had a few “throw my back out” moments in my life but nothing comes close to this.
Deadlifting 100kg and didn’t warm up properly like an IDIOT, seriously deserve it, what was I thinking."
So I thought my 205 pounds was pretty heavy but since other people lift it so easily, I felt pretty weak having injured my back on a mere 205 pounds. 100kg is pretty close to 205 pounds, it's 220 pounds, and this person wrecked his back too. Glad it is a heavy weight for some people too.
One good advice I can take from the thread, is to not ego lift. If you feel like you can't do a rep, stop, don't push yourself. I probably should have stopped after 1 rep on these exercises.
"Everybody I've talked to has at some point hurt their back deadlifting. Experienced lifters and myself included. The risk isn't worth the reward in my opinion unless you're a power lifter."
What's the point of a deadlift anyway? It's not really an exercise or a practical thing you'll do much of. I saw a vegan on Threads deadlifting 700 pounds today, I'm pretty sure it 700 pounds, done by Nick Squires, aka MeatyMcsorely. That's more than 3 times the weight I lifted that broke my back. What will I gain from being able to deadlift as much weight? Is it worth it? That's so incredibly difficult.
200 pounds is pretty light, in comparison to veterans who've done it for a while. I definitely want to be able to deadlift more, even though there's no practical benefit to it, I do like the exercise and the idea of beating my previous best, but yeah I will be taking it a lot more slowly.
"Powerlifted and played football in high school. Didn't squat seriously for about 2 years. One day decided to start up again, put 225 on the rack as a warm up set. 6th rep or something hurt my knee. Have had knee problems ever since. From 20 years old to now, at 28, my knee is a constant issue."
Yeah. If I ever take time off from exercising, I will have to ease up to where I was before. I injured my back because I didn't warm up to where I was before, I immediately jumped up to it, and even exceeded it.
Anyway, that was my day today. I worked for the entire day today. It's surprising, I thought there was this mythical "you can only work for 4 hours total in a day before losing all of your inhibition" based on what this productivity freak said. But I was able to do more than that, I worked for like 8+ hours straight, non-stop today, and I wasn't even tired. Anyway, I still need to work on my fitness a lot more.
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