Thigh Bruise--What to do and not do during recovery
Three weeks ago I had an accident (not on the bike) that severely injured my left thigh. I am writing this to share with others what I learned during this process.
Right after my fall I eleveted and iced my leg. This was the right thing to do. I should have done it a lot more unfortunately I was taking my mom to the baseball game for Mother's day so I got up to take a shower. While in the shower I ran hot water on the leg and massaged the injured part of the leg. This was the wrong thing to do. While it felt great at the time it was accelerating the bleeding for which I would pay later.
Sitting at the baseball game also was a problem because my leg wasn't elevated and I was slightly pinching off the circulation in my leg. After about 5 innings of baseball the leg was swollen stiff and very sore. It was difficult to walk up the stairs and drive home.
That night the leg was very painfull. I kept it elevated and on ice as much as I could but by then the damage was done and I would just have to wait for the injury to heal and the internal bleeding to stop.
I continued to ice my leg for several days until I was told I could apply some heat. For heat I chose to use our hot tub. This is not the type of heat you should use. The heat should have been local and not general like you get in a hot tube. While I was in the hot tub I would rub the sore part of the leg which wasn't a good thing to do.
After over three weeks I am finally able to walk normally and get back on a bike for short rides. I am stil icing my leg each night and keeping it elevated. I don't know how much I exacerbated by injury by applying heat and massage too early but I sure learned the hard way not to do that for future injuries.