Owie January 24, 2006
Horror of horrors. It seems that Dave’s been able to get me hooked on Halo 2 on the Xbox. Egads. LOL Oh dear. We played so long about a week and a half ago that my right hand ached for nearly a week. Ordinarily somewhat strong just from the needlework I do, seems my right hand was not equal to the task of shooting aliens with impunity (though the rest of me enjoyed the experience more than I like to admit).
Then, as soon as it was starting to feel human again (”it” being my hand), I woke up with a bad case of carpal tunnel. In my right hand. The thumb. How fair is that?
So, my hand’s been close to useless for nearly two weeks. Arg!
For the first few days of the second attack, I couldn’t figure out why my hand hurt so badly. And it hurt a lot more this time than the simple muscle ache of the week before. I hadn’t been playing Halo again. Had been good and pretty much staying away from knitting and stitching.
Most confusing.
Irritating, really. On top of being quite painful.
We finally sat down and talked about it. Dave asked if the back of my thumb hurt, too. Yes. How about the wrist? Hm. Now that you mention it, when I put pressure on the back of my wrist it hurts. And higher up the forearm? Yup, that hurts, too. Gads. Carpal tunnel. Marvy.
I complained about it to my good friend Mary-Anne, and she had me locate a certain pressure point up on my shoulder… Let me find the email… Here it is. This is what she said:
There is a spot .. on your trapezius muscle.. if you put your hand on the opposite shoulder.. thumb touching your neck.. the fingers should land on it.. you will find it very tight and tender… gentle pressure on it will help relieve the carpal tunnel.
Here’s me. Totally willing to try it if it costs nothing, has no bad side effects, and might even work. So I grope around on my right shoulder with my left hand until… Ouch! Ooh, that must be the spot. Massaged it a little, then left it alone. Same thing a while later… I’ve been massaging that tender spot on my shoulder periodically for the last couple of days, and though nowhere near healed, my hand is at least somewhat usable again. Woohoo! And, I can knit again. Gently. Seems I knit fairly well without really using my right thumb. 
All this for the convenience of the fourth button on my nifty five-button cordless mouse. I’m not currently sure it’s worth it, and have given up use of that fourth button that I’d been too so reliant on.
Yea, Mary-Anne! Thank you, girlfriend. You’re the best!
Jenn January 25
I’ve printed out this post so I have that trapezius reference available for teh next time MY wrist goes bonkers on me. Thank you Laura and Thank you Mary-Anne!!!