I Survived Elbow Tendonitis

It was about 3 weeks after I got a Nintendo switch for my 41st birthday that I started having a really awful feeling in my elbow and the surrounding muscle area on my arm. It was such a reminder I am getting old!  Since I also have long loved fiber arts like knitting and crochet, spinning, sewing, embroidery and such- I am familiar with getting a tired or achy arm. I can’t place all the blame on my adorable pink Switch but I really was going hard for hours playing different new versions of Tetris (it was my first gaming experience since original Nintendo and Gameboy in the 80s and 90s) I would feel the blood drained from my fingers and still clutch it playing more 

I never went to a doctor, but diagnosed myself through Google searching. I’m pretty sure it was “tennis elbow” also called elbow tendonitis, or lateral epicondylitis for some reason, and that it’s caused by repetitive stress (aka living life, having fun and cool hobbies you enjoy intensely).  It’s not the worst thing that has ever happened to me but it really sucked and ruined a lot of my enjoyment of my favorite crafts and gaming for a while. 

Like most American millennials I have no healthcare, but doctors and physical therapists on YouTube helped me out and told me what to do, thankfully. My web searches suggested it would take 6 to 8 weeks to heal and that was absolutely correct! I learned from videos the specific stretches to alleviate the problem and pulled back drastically on the time that I spent doing stressful and repetitive motions. It was impossible to stop completely but I limited myself to a minute or two only. I used ice packs and Biofreeze professional gel I ordered from Amazon, Advil gel caps, also I got something called a Therabar to do a particular strengthening exercise and an arm brace. I set timers on my phone throughout the day to remind myself to work on massaging or stretching my poor little elbow and by the 8th week I was healed! 

To entertain myself and alleviate anxiety during that time I tried to get into new activities and things that didn’t stress out my elbow as much so I watched TV sitting with good posture (foreign language shows with subtitles are good for this) I bought flowers to arrange into bouquets and promote a healing environment. I cleaned and organized my home extremely, joined an adult beginners ballet class, listened to audiobooks and just walk around.. it was boring and torturous sometimes but I tried to be positive. I was trying to be open minded and enjoy myself in case I was not able to return to the old repetitive stress causing hobbies again. Thankfully I am well now! I am being more chill and moderate about breaks from crafting too