Tag: health

Carpal Diem

Well, my annual trip on the medical merri-go-round has been interesting. I went to my pprimary care doctor for a referral to a hand surgeon to fix the trigger finger on my right hand.

The hand surgeon gave me a cortisone injection at the base of my middle finger. It appeared to work as expected. Alas, the hand surgeon also asked several questions about my fingers and hand. I told him I have numbness at the tip of my middle finger which I attributed to the removal of a cyst before the pandemic.

He said that wasn’t likely and did a simple diagnostic test and said, “you have carpal tunnel syndrome.” This would explain the general numbness and aching I have been getting in my hand for the last year or so. Occasionally the pain wakes me up.

The doctor gave me a splint (looks like a roller blader’s wrist guard) to wear while sleeping. Off I went to a neurologist for an electromyography (EMG), a systematic test of nerve function. I’ve had one before and it was extremely painful. This time the test wasn’t nearly as bad, only slightly worse than getting a series a static electric charges. More annoying than painful.

The test results essentially confirmed the hand surgeon’s diagnosis. The nerves in both my hands are a little weak but test of the median nerve (the one that sends signals to most of the fingers) came back “NR”. This means “no response.” Derp.

(I asked if this meant the neurologist botched the test. The hand surgeon said that this was not likely. “She’s really good.” That’s the sense I got from the neurologist, too. Dang Doesn’t hurt to ask, I suppose.)

If I do nothing, the numbness and general weakness in my hand is likely to get worse. So I am scheduled for surgery in a couple of weeks. Barring some unforeseen problem, the surgery is likely to last about ten minutes. The doctor will be using a laproscope. This means the surgical incision will be about and inch or so wide. Using the scope, he will cut through a ligament that runs across the base of my hand. The tiny incision should greatly speed my recovery. Assuming nothing goes wrong, I should be good to return to normal activities in a few days. Of course, for me, “normal” means riding my bike. I suspect that I’ll be limited to my recumbent for a while. The doctor said the success rate is about 90 percent. That’s confirmed by all the videos I’ve been watching online.

I had hoped to do a supported, spring tour of the Natchez Trace. Two of the three tours I was looking at have already sold out. The last one is in early April. I will wait until my post-op visit with the surgeon and, with luck, sign up. Otherwise I’ll do it in the fall.

If any of you have had carpal tunnel release syndrome or know someone who did, let me know in the comments.

Getting Well

After my trip to London I was a physical wreck. I think I am starting to get well.

My one-month cold is almost gone. Lord knows my sinuses must be tired of producing so much gunk.

I have had a nasty pain in my upper left arm for more than a year. It’s occasional but extremely painful, like someone is stabbing me. It seems that the shorter stem I put on Little Nellie is helping a lot. I haven’t woken up with a dagger in my arm for a few days. Now that I think about it, the pain went away when I was on my bike tour on The Mule, a bike with a similar reach to the handlebars. (This is not a coincidence; Little Nellie was custom made to mimic the geometry of The Mule.) So, maybe the culprit is the geometry of my Cross Check. Hmmm.

My left hip is still wonky but it’s definitely better. I do two PT exercises specifically for it. Then I do my runners calf stretch. This, for some reason, helps with my lower back. After that comes my mishmash of about 20 yoga and PT exercises. The whole thing took me 30 minutes today. I am going to add some foam roller exercises soon because why be bored shitless when you can torture yourself too!

My left knee is still barking a bit. I use a pillow between my legs when I sleep and this keeps it from aching at night.

For whatever reason my legs no longer feel like concrete. My thighs are still tight, so tight as to completely rule out certain yoga asanas from the book I am using.

I was weighed at the doctor’s office the other day. 218 pounds is way too heavy for me. I spent some time backing up pictures from my laptop to an external hard drive. I saw a picture of me at the 50 States Ride, six months ago. Yep. I done ate too many cookies this Christmas. The added weight probably isn’t helping my legs, hip, and back when I walk 7 or 8 miles in one go either.

Off to bed for this busy boy. I have to get up at dawn to get a CT scan. They will inject me with contrasting dye. It imparts a warm tingly feeling from the top of the head to the groin (I don’t know why I’ve never felt it in my legs) as it spreads through the blood stream.

Too bad this anti-freeze doesn’t linger in the system. I have a 35 mile bike ride to do tomorrow morning.