I got myself a shoulder support couple of days back and since then am outta this sling.
Godd...it does feel great to be roaming around without that wounded appearance...
There was this minor cosmetic problem...the difference in the appearance of my hands...and...It was overcome..
got myself a wind-sheater...
so..am all set...back to "normalcy" after 9 months..
One thing I must agree...It does keeps you contemplating on ways to do things single-handedly..
My son Chase (age 7)just had his shoulder taped for support and to get him out of the sling because it's causing internal rotation problems. He's not all that excited about being out of the sling (doesn't like the tape) and I'm not as excited as I thought I'd be having him look more "normal" without the sling. I'm glad you're happy to be sling free and I'm sure feeling "normal" is freeing. My main concern is his returning to school and kids not realizing he has a "hurt" arm. It looks too normal out of the sling and now I'm wondering what our next step is before we return to school. I think I'll talk to our OT about other options like the Wilmer shoulder orthosis for school. Good luck to you!
Lourdes
I don't remember what Dr. Belzburg did surgically - but John had to continue wearing his sling in school so his arm wouldn't get wrenched back in crowded hallways. That might have pulled the transferred nerves out. But otherwise, he was out of the sling. One thing that too much sling can create is the arm "wanting" to hang more in front than down the side. John should try to hold his shoulders back to help the arm swing to the side, but 18 years of slumping is hard to overcome!
Injury Description, Date, extent, surgical intervention etc: MVA in 2001, nerve graph in 2002, Median Nerve Transfer in 2004 and an unsuccessful Gracillis Muscle Transfer in 2006. I am living life and loving it! Feel free to contact me :)
I was excited to get out of a sling too! I wore one for 2 1/2 years!!! I think I was scared to get rid of it! I still wear one occasionally.... yard work or deep cleaning my house, a lot of bunding over, as the arm just falls and it gets sore.... Glad to hear that you guys are out of yours too!!! YEAHH!!! One day we should have a sling burning party! It coul be very liberating!!
Hi Ellen,
I'm wondering if John had to wear the sling to protect against wrenching his shoulder back because they transfered his intercostals? Chase had his spinal accessory transfered to suprascapular and a lot of grafting on C5 & C6, but Dr Belzberg said they intentionally put in long grafts to allow for stretching w/o injuring the grafts. I've learned wearing the sling too often is not a good thing and initially we were told to have him in the sling all day and at night! It's amazing how varied the protocols and information is from the professionals. Chase was in that thing day and night for almost 4 months. He prefers the sling to the tape, but hopefully we'll find something that works all the way around. To prevent his arm from swinging around, I did try attaching a picture hook or cup hook to his hard splint and hooking it on his belt loop and that seems to work pretty good - gonna run it by our OT tomorrow (got that idea from Onepaw's Borg arm).
Lourdes
