Well, this is fun. I’m sure some higher power is definitely smiting me for not posting in a while—I’m sure my one reader has felt sorely disappointed. But I’m the one feeling sore now! So, the joke’s on me, I guess…
Between enjoying my girlfriend’s spring break with her, her family being in town, her getting sick, and also (mostly) my own laziness, I haven’t been powerlifting in a few weeks. So, why the injury? Possibly because I haven’t been powerlifting. My doctor and I are pretty sure that I must have cranked my neck pretty hard while sleeping for this to happen because I woke up with this pain. One of my friends also posited that I may have had bad sleeping habits for a while now and that it was this moment of muscle weakness (since I haven’t been working out) that made it much worse. Makes sense to me! I have a (bad) habit of sleeping with my hands above or behind my head as if I’m lounging, which is also how I was sleeping when I woke up with this pain.
Anyway, what even is cervical radiculopathy? Luckily, my cervix is doing just fine. The cervical refers to cervical vertebrae. According to the diagnosis of my symptoms—due in particular to the fact that I feel shooting pain all the way into my middle finger—, it is likely that my C6 and C7 vertebrae did a squishy on the intervertebral disc between them, causing that yummy spinal jelly to herniate, and said herniation is putting pressure on one of the nerve roots in the brachial plexus. Isn’t that fun? Not really. This has left me with radiating pain in the left side of the neck into my left shoulder (which I initially thought was just muscle soreness) as well as occasional shooting pain down my arm, which often ends in my middle finger.
I’m on steroids for 18 days, working on my posture, sleeping with a soft cervical collar, and I’ll be working on strengthening my neck again soon (likely with the help of another friend’s dad). Also, sleeping with a soft cervical collar is a bitch. Actually, let me clarify. Falling asleep while wearing a soft cervical collar is a bitch. Once I was asleep, I slept rather well. The good news is that I’m rather functional and I’ve already worked on increasing my mobility with my neck as the steroids kick in to reduce my pain and herniation. The roid rage hasn’t kicked in yet, but this is only day two.
I’d love to post a linguistics-related update soon, which will likely focus on the schwa and how I plan to use it in the Greyfolk language.
(More like cervical ridiculouspathy, am I right?)