So, it turns out, I have 20 year old instincts while playing volleyball, but a 36 year old worn out body. Back on 11 Mar, while playing volleyball and pushing off my left foot, I felt a snap when someone hit my calf with a tire iron, well at least that is what it felt like. I stumbled off the court, put some ice on it. I was still able to hobble around with pain, so I wasn't sure what happened. I subbed myself out, put some ice on it, and just coached the rest of the game instead of playing. After the game, stopped by the med clinic, got some pain killers and headed home. The next day, my calf had swollen up about twice normal size, but that was nothing compared to the bruising and bleeding that were about to appear a couple days later. At any rate, a week later I went back to the clinic and saw the orthopedic surgeon who confirmed it was a Medial Gastrocnemius Muscle Tear (it seperated from the Achilles Tendon). He said I wouldn't need surgery, but would need 3-6 months for it to recover. I've been doing physical therapy most every day, they have me do exercises, then do a soft tissue massage (this does not feel good at all, they basically stick their fingers in the torn area and move stuff around) and finish up with some Inter Ferential Current (this means they electrocute my leg for about 15 minutes).
A couple of days ago the therapist decided to tape up my ankle, and sort of make me a second achilles tendon using eleastic tape, and this relieves a lot of stress on helps me walk so much better, almost without a limp.
Despite the improvement in getting around, its still not strong enough to play volleyball, which means I missed the final two games of the intramural season and will miss the play-offs something I've been looking forward to for 4 months now. I've played the previous two seasons, when we have come in second place to the Services Squadron, but we finally had the team to beat them. BUT, our back-row specialist went TDY up-range, our best setter went on R&R, and I'm the other setter, so we are going to be hard pressed to beat them now.
Oh well.
Just 40 more days here, and I'm headed home, so I'll have to focus on that instead of volleyball.
