#ROADTORECOVERY – DISTAL BICEP TENDON TEAR – JOURNAL NO.1

Ok, well this maybe almost 3 months late but, it’s time to document the things I went through at the time, and for you to all know the struggle I went through then.

August 2015

So, how did this accident occur? Well, a few weeks prior I signed up for my first strongman competition. I start to train for the even 2-3 times week, and during one of my training sessions I had an accident. I was training for the Farmers Walk event, when a gym goer didn’t see the path I was walking and started to walk backwards into my lane. I was FW with roughly 500lbs of weight, when I had to veer to the right to avoid hitting him, then that made my grip start to weaken, but when I was trying to lower the weight, the loss in focus and form didnt approve with my lower left arm distal bicep tendon, and it snapped instantly.

When it happened I felt no pain, but I did feel my bicep shoot up some, and I knew that wasnt normal. I was in complete shock, and I asked my training team to help me unload the weights I was using so I could leave and goto the ER. I called my wife, and I started to freak out. About 30-40 minutes after the injury, the elbow/insertion area started to ache….bad. I made it to the ER, and thank goodness I didn’t have to wait long to be seen.

When the doctor saw me, they couldn’t give me a 100% diagnosis. The doctor thought it was a strain/sprain of the tendon, but he referred me to see an orthopedic surgeon. I got multiple people referring me to Doctor Richard Ravalin of Monterey Spine and Joint. After I saw Dr.Ravalin a few days later, he instantly diagnosed me with a distal bicep tendon rupture. I schedule my surgery for the closest Friday, as it is best to get this surgery done within 10-14 days after the injury occurred, because after that the tendon will start to retract and will make the entire reattachment process far more difficult, and chances of improving the injury will decrease.

Up until the surgery however, I did hit the gym as usual. I trained legs, I did as much upper body as I could, since I knew I would be out of upperbody action for a while after surgery. I remember being told the recovery time for 100% fully healed would be 4-6 months (my heart automatically dropped). All that I worked hard up until that point would be gone until I could hit the gym and training hard again. I had a rough plan on what I had to do until then, but I couldn’t tell if it would benefit until I stepped into it…