38 years old, recently got my blue belt at BJJ. Got caught in a guillotine, the guy fell backwards and my head hit into the mat whilst my chin was tucked in trying to defend the choke. My report reads: “At C5/C6 severe compression of the spinal cord with the suspicion of incipient compressive myelopathy and probable left C6 nerve root compression, mainly due to a large left dominant disc protrusion; additional small left dominant C5/C6 osteophytes and uncovertrbral joint hypertrophy is noted. No nerve root or spinal cord compression at the other levels. Multiple small, noncompressive thoracic disc protrusions. It has been communicated that the findings might be clinically urgent and that the referring clinician should receive this report promptly.” I think they are going to remove the disc and fuse the spine. Is there any way back to BJJ from this, please give me some hope.
I just wanted to give my sympathy mate. I can't answer your question but being sidelined from injury is always tough. I hope it turns out not to be a permanent hiatus. Best wishes.
Try spinal decompression first. Make sure there is always someone with you when doing so you don't feint and then die. I'm not saying it will work but it might alleviate it without surgery. Good luck man.
This is something you need qualified medical advice for. DO NOT TAKE MEDICAL ADVICE FROM STRANGERS ONLINE (WHO WON'T BE QUALIFIED) you can definitely make a bad situation worse. People who are qualified won't give you advice online. For what it's worth Ive trained with two people who have had moderate spinal problems, (several slipped discs and osteophytes etc) however having a safe and sensible training environment is a must. Go talk to your Doctor/surgeon, get fixed and then BJJ will be there for you then. Good luck!
Yeah also this. The spinal decompression should be given an okay by your doctor who knows more about your injury that I do
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Bad news Picture of the offending disc, seeing a surgeon Monday to find out what treatment is available. Hopefully I will be able to return
Disc out and fusion is the only option available. The symptoms I’m getting are due to spinal chord damage, he’s hopeful it will resolve when the disk is removed....bummer!
Having a solution to spinal cord issues is great news! Make sure you hit the physio hard when you can!! Good luck!!!!
Regarding injury and sports I'd recommend listening to your physio and not your doctor. Doctors don't believe in sports or agree with them in my experience.
Depends on the Doc in my experience. My orthopedist works hand in hand with some physios and they have great results; they also teamed up, to get me ready for my teachers grading when I was being Uke for him a while back and had big troubles with my former broken then still damaged arm. But I do agree so far, that I like to get the opinion of physio as well!
Dude. The guy has spinal cord issues, he very very definitely should listen to his doctor, o That very much depends in the Dr or surgeon, loads of orthapods are rugby players, a friend of mine who's a female anesthetist is a good boxer. The guy also has a potential spinal cord issue, telling him to ignore his Dr is incredibly dumb. Don't train right now, have the op, do the physio and then see how it goes, having full use of your spinal cord is more important then training long term.
Just had the surgery Thursday and now at home recovering. The surgeon said I can resume the gym in 6 weeks but give it 6 months before going back to BJJ, it takes a while for the bones to fully fuse. I think I’m going to take up yoga in the downtime.
The yoga for bjj site is great! Good luck on the rehab, two training partners of mine have got neck issues at the moment, they both train accordingly, don't use butterfly, don't let themselves be stacked, tap early and often, and only train with non meat heads.
glad to here you are recovering. Find a professional who works with rehabbing sportsmen. it is important that you are very clear that you are on the same page when talking about pain and discomfort. discomfort is often something to be worked through. But pain might be sign that you aggravating the injury. Martial artists have a tendency of toughing things out. This can lead to over training. this can slow recovery or in the worse case actually make injuries worse. The solution is to talk through things with your phyiso. Makes sure you are on the same page, that you both mean the same thing when you say pain or discomfort. it is also it worth writing questions down in advance, taking the list in with you to consultations and using a phone app to video record your sessions. the job of the physio is to help you to recover as fully as possible. the better you communicate with your physio the better you will recover.
Feeling pretty damn good at the moment, pain is very minimal. Got some tightness around the traps and scapula but that was always there, I’m just unable to stretch/roll it out for now. Itching to get back to some form of exercise, waiting 6 weeks will kill me. Will get a good trigger point massage at 4-5 weeks in, I have a Physio friend who has kept me training relatively pain free for years, we are looking at a specific plan to realign and strengthen the spine. Along with the yoga, I’m confident of making a full recovery. I’ve never been flexible, always strong but no flex. I think that’s been a major factor in my spinal health. That’s about to change with the new training - less weights more stretch, eccentric work...etc Well as long as I can keep it up, it’s tempting to just go and pick up some heavy weights
Folks Speaking from experience, not listening to your doctor WILL come back to bite you, maybe not right away, but it will...5...10..20 years later. And a spinal injury is nothing to mess with; not being able to BJJ and live with the injury and very likely take up another martial art is a heck of a lot better than not being able to do BJJ because one decided not ot listen to the medical professionals and ends up crippled. I once dated a woman who was a professional Ballerina. She was diagnoses with a spinal issue that required her spin be fused. Obviously the Ballet career was done. She went to college after that and when I knew her she was a psychologist and Shaolin Kung Fu person, I meant her in the Shaolin Kung Fu Class. And I have to tell you...DAMN! an ex ballerina doing Shaolin long fist is a thing of beauty.... and she could kick damn hard too. I use to ignore my doctors too, 3 broken ankles, torn meniscus in both knees, multiple other injuries and now at over half a century old I have arthritis in both knees, both hips and one shoulder. It is possible I may have ended up with that anyway, but not listening to the doctors sure didn't help, especially with the knee injuries. As a matter of fact I could have ignored my doctors are recently as a few months ago. I was back training JKD and I loved it, and had decided to see how far this over the hill old geezer could take it, but I was told I had a retina issue in my one good eye and getting hit could cause an issue. Now I could have said the heck with it and kept going and maybe nothing would have happened. But then maybe I could end up blind too and my job depends on me being able to see and I have family that depends on me and the risk was not worth letting them down. Oh the bad eye, was a total detached retina that they (2 doctors) are amazed I can see out of as well as I do. But it is far from perfect and I cannot look at a computer screen with it, so I sit here with one eye closed most of the time. Got that injury training Wing Chun and getting hit directly in the eye. But I will admit, I was not going against anything a doctor had said when that happened. Although my family doctor studied with the same Shifu. It has already been said here.... do not get medical advice from people you don't really know on the web. And don't take medical advice form folks you know in real life who are not medical professionals....... listen to your doctor...I cannot stress that enough
