Ah, The Joys Of A Painful Rib

Yesterday evening, probably around 6:45 PM, I started hurting on my left side. And then, it turned into a charlie horse...in my ribs. Feels like it was the muscle in between my first and second rib on that side. Tough to rub that out, but I think I mostly got it. Today, I’m very, very sore. If I hiccup, cough, laugh, yawn, move suddenly, or anything like that, there will be pain. Never mind what will happen if I happen to sneeze.

Before anyone wonders how a charlie horse in the ribs can happen, it apparently happens in my family for no reason at all. Mom gets them, too. She also gets the full body ones. I sort of got to witness that (she got into a bathroom stall, and stayed there because she didn’t want to worry me) when I was 7, and brought all the teachers running in that area of the building, and the principal to come help (they had wondered why I had run at insane speeds to the office, since that wasn’t like me) before calling Dad. She was fine within three hours. Mom and Dad went to the ER, she waited for over three hours, and by the time they could tell her she was fine, she didn’t hurt anymore.

I myself had one of those in 12th grade, but it didn’t result in a trip to the ER, because I either didn’t want to be a bother in class, or I just didn’t want to miss what the homework was supposed to be. I hid the agony for a few minutes until accounting class was over, got to the library, and convinced the librarian I needed to go into another room to help with some filing, locked the door behind me and managed to fix things.

Today, Ben Gay patches, hot wash rags, and Aleve are being applied judiciously.

Ah, The Joys Of A Painful Rib

Yesterday evening, probably around 6:45 PM, I started hurting on my left side. And then, it turned into a charlie horse...in my ribs. Feels like it was the muscle in between my first and second rib on that side. Tough to rub that out, but I think I mostly got it. Today, I’m very, very sore. If I hiccup, cough, laugh, yawn, move suddenly, or anything like that, there will be pain. Never mind what will happen if I happen to sneeze.

Before anyone wonders how a charlie horse in the ribs can happen, it apparently happens in my family for no reason at all. Mom gets them, too. She also gets the full body ones. I sort of got to witness that (she got into a bathroom stall, and stayed there because she didn’t want to worry me) when I was 7, and brought all the teachers running in that area of the building, and the principal to come help (they had wondered why I had run at insane speeds to the office, since that wasn’t like me) before calling Dad. She was fine within three hours. Mom and Dad went to the ER, she waited for over three hours, and by the time they could tell her she was fine, she didn’t hurt anymore.

I myself had one of those in 12th grade, but it didn’t result in a trip to the ER, because I either didn’t want to be a bother in class, or I just didn’t want to miss what the homework was supposed to be. I hid the agony for a few minutes until accounting class was over, got to the library, and convinced the librarian I needed to go into another room to help with some filing, locked the door behind me and managed to fix things.

Today, Ben Gay patches, hot wash rags, and Aleve are being applied judiciously.