Earlier this evening, following dinner, my wife was standing on a smaller foot stool to reorganize some knick knacks in the dinning room cabinet and when stepping off, took a bit of a tumble.
She was in enough pain that we went to the ER at the UofU, and after xrays, and an MRI, it turns our she has a broken disk in her lower back.
It was not serious enough to require admittance to the hospital, so she is home with a back brace, and we need to return Monday to see what the medical folks suggest as next steps, (which initially does not sound like it includes surgery - Thank God!).
It was not, however, the way we expected to spend our Thursday evening.
The members of this board are not generally on the younger end of the spectrum, so I’m commenting here on our experience to remind everyone to take a bit of extra care with what might seem like any silly little task.
I tell our Masters (older folks) racers the same thing. Recovery takes longer, you have work on Monday (most of them), none of it is worth doing something dumb just to win a race for bragging rights.
You always hear about strength training and walking as you age. Even just one day a week of weight lifting for 30 minutes, gives you 80% of the benefit.
I was listening to a podcast today that talked about doing other routine movements so your body doesn’t unlearn them. Running, jumping, and simple balance exercise can help. They mentioned standing on one leg while putting on socks is something you can do daily that greatly helps you keep your balance into your later years.
I feel like I do enough of the other stuff, but I can’t remember the last time I jumped or ran, stuff that we did every day as a kid.
I just saw this, @salUTE. I hope your wife is already doing better. I have learned that backs are surprisingly fragile things, also, stairs, can be treacherous.Two or three years ago, my wife was carrying Christmas ornaments down a staircase. The items were piled high in her arms, and so she didn’t look carefully where she was going and missed a step. The result was a tibial fracture that did not require surgery, but was a pain in many ways. A while back I noticed that I had just missed a step on a staircase by an inch, clipping my heel on the step. I almost went flying, but grabbed onto the bannister and saved myself. I now make sure my hand is on the bannister every time I am using a staircase.
She’s doing better than either of us expected, thanks for asking, and yes, particularly as many of us have passed the 50 year old mark, it’s time to watch out for stairs, step stools, and stay off of ladders.