Broken bones, arthritis and replacement joints

I hear another story about broken bones, arthritis and replacement joints whenever I play pickleball. In March of last year, I joined the broken bone group when I fell playing pickleball. I broke my fall with my left arm, protecting my hard head from cracking open when it hit the court. It happened fast, but the pain was immediate and intense. I screamed, and someone called 911.

The only other bone I had broken was my big toe. I saw stars then, but that pain was nowhere near the agony of this arm. I broke the radius bone very close to my wrist, making recovery tricky. The local orthopedic surgeon in The Keys decided to perform a closed reduction, basically pushing the bone back into place and putting me in a plastic brace. He told me not to loosen it or remove it for a month. When I did, I had no range of motion; it was not pretty.

By June, it became clear that it was not healing properly. The orthopedic surgeon gave me the bad news back home – they had to break it again and surgically repair the bone. Due to that plastic brace, I also had Carpal Tunnel that needed fixing. The surgery took 5 hours and left me with plates on both the top and bottom, secured by screws.

Walking was the most exercise I could do for the rest of the summer, but I survived and kept busy working with the new owners of Active Adults Realty. You can see the brace on my left wrist in this video Christine Davis, and I did in April 2021 – https://blog.activeadultsdelaware.com/2021/04/27/delaware-real-estate-market-update-with-kathy-sperl-bell-and-christine-davis/

Braces, wraps and compression sleeves

But I was very lucky. You should see the variety of knee braces, elbow braces, compression sleeves, wraps and elbow pads on my pickleball buddies. In some cases, a full-body wrap seems like a good idea! Just today, one of our best players was on his way for an MRI when he left the court. His back gives him fits, and he hopes the doctor can fix it. Bob wins tournaments and plans to do a lot more of that.

Arthritis!

Then there is arthritis. My right thumb looks like I am hitchhiking all the time. The knuckle is twice the size of the thumb on my left hand. Gripping the paddle can be annoying at best and painful at times. I call it my barometer, a predictor of a coming front. So, I commiserate with my pickleball buddies and go home to nurse my aching body parts, to return in the morning.