My Rib is Injured… Again!

Several summers ago, I got sick. The worst part of getting sick for me is always this nasty cough that I get. This particular summer, the cough was so bad that I heard a “snap” following a hard cough. I didn’t notice anything at first though I had a huge feeling that something was terribly wrong. It wasn’t until later that I figured it out.

I jumped in my father’s truck that he had let me borrow while working away. And as soon as I had jumped up into the seat, I felt it. It was a tight feeling at first, but then quickly developed into a bad pain. I could barely turn the steering wheel. In the short 5 minute drive to the trailer I was renting, I knew I had to call my mother to come drive me to the hospital. I had to wait a fair time for her as I was about 45 minutes away, but she quickly came and took me to the hospital.

The hospital was about another 30 minutes from where I was, and the wait at the hospital was about 2 hours. The problem was, by the time I was registered and sitting in the waiting room, I was having a hard time breathing. All I can remember is intense pain and focussing on low and shallow breaths.

We waited for awhile until my mother decided to check where we were on the list, only to find out that we had been bumped down rather than up and the wait from that point was longer than 2 hours. It hurts to breathe but I’m not a serious case? My mother was mad to say the least.

We hopped in the car, and headed to the next hospital an hour away. It was a shorter time than I would have had to wait at the first hospital, and this hospital took me in right away. The only problem was, I had popped a rib muscle, which the doctor promptly told me hurts as much as breaking a rib (crazy pain), and there was nothing they could do except give me Tylenol 3.

Now some people I knew would have gone crazy over Tylenol 3. My mother had a mini freak-out session about how I might become addicted to it, but after telling her everything would be fine, I got my prescription and was on my way.

It was a painful summer. The T3s didn’t touch the pain hardly at all. I always walked around with one hand putting pressure on that rib area. It was awful. Nothing but time was able to heal that wound.

Once again, I was sick a few weeks ago and the cough has mostly gone but not completely. I know my body has suffered a little more than normal (didn’t help when my chiropractor asked what happened except I had been doing nothing but sleeping and sitting on the couch, trying to get better), but my body still seemed in decent shape. I worked out this week and everything seemed good.

Last night was a chest workout, and even though I warmed up and stretched, in the very first exercise (bench press), my rib started to hurt. I can’t remember if it is the same side or not, but I’m pretty sure I popped a stupid rib muscle again. It hurts so bad and I have to put pressure on the area to even try to take a deep breath. My abs are also starting to hurt because of the way I have to modify my body when I need to cough. It’s miserable.

I had just gotten well enough to start back in the gym and this is what happens! Ah!

To be honest, I wasn’t going to complete my workout last night because of the pain. But as I sat in the locker room, looking at my open locker as I was going to change, I got mad, closed and locked my locker, and went out and did the incline dumbbell press. I’m pretty sure it was a very dumb idea. I’m pretty sure I made it worse. I had written down to do 4 sets of 12, but after 3 sets, I knew I was being ridiculous. I shouldn’t be mad, although it was hard to not at least be disappointed.

So here I am with heat packs and taking it easy. I would much rather be in the gym but I’ve done my damage and I should know better. Injuries are something to take serious and it’s very important to know when to quit. So learn from my mistake and save yourself some pain. I’m all about lifting heavy and “sucking-it-up” in most situations, but I felt the pain and knew I should have quit. Next time, I will.