Why does my wrist hurt after bowling?
When the wrist begins to hurt after a bowling game, it is mostly because of an injury to the muscles or nerves around the carpals of the wrist. Most times, the issue starts with growing numbness around the forearm down to the hand. In such a scenario, the carpal tunnel syndrome is most suspected. For temporal or immediate relief, you can try working with ice packs.
How to stop wrist pain from bowling
Below are some tips that can help you prevent pain along your wrist while or after bowling;
- Ensure that the finger grips in your bowling ball are just the right fit for your fingers. For example, when the holes are too big or too small, or too far apart, a lot of tension is applied along their length.
On the other wise though, when the grips are just of the right size, the ball gets to sit right within the crest of your palm.
- Don’t hurry to make another throw after making the first. Take breaks. That way, your muscles get to relax intermittently.
- Just before you throw the ball, ensure that your body is in the right stance. Your knees should be bent in a right-angle just before you throw the ball unto the bowling lane.
You should also make sure your moves are fluid and relaxed enough. That way, you don’t have to exert too much force on the ball to get it moving.
- If you are just starting out at bowling, don’t rush your sessions. Go at a slow and steady pace. What this means is that you should not bowl every day.
You can increase from one day a week to two day a week, to more, while ensuring that the schedule isn’t causing you discomfort or pain.
What are the symptoms of wrist pain
The bowling game concentrates a lot on the wrist—the bones and muscles. The wrist is also a very delicate joint as it consists of several bones (ulna, radius, carpals, and metacarpals), blood vessels, nerves, and tendons.
These tendons are very vital in the movement of the bones comprising the wrist and they consist of the flexor and extensor tendons.
The flexor tendons are located along the palm of the hand. They allow for the rotation of the hand. The extensor tendons on the other hand help with the backward bending of the wrist.
Asides from that, the wrist joint is also useful for most of our everyday activities. For this reason, you want to ensure that you don’t stress your wrists too much.
The bowling game involves the throwing of bowling balls and duck pins that weigh more than sixteen pounds along a bowling lane.
You’d agree that the flick or move that makes for this throw exerts a lot of force on the hand and wrist.
So, continuous bowling (or bowling too quickly) could cause issues like elbow tendonitis, herniated disc, anterior ligament tear, posterior ligament tear, etc.
Most times, before these very severe conditions arise, you’d have been warned by your body. Usually, it’d start with a feel of sharp pain around you wrist. You could also see one or more of the following symptoms;
- Pain
- Swelling around the joint
- Redness of the wrist joint
- Tenderness of the joint
- Numbness of the fingers and hands
- Tingling sensation around the hands and fingers
- Muscle fatigue
- Soreness of the muscles present in the hands and wrists
- Tearing of the muscles.
The more intense or serious the injury is, the more the symptoms that’d show up. That is why it is very necessary to visit the doctor once you begin to note one or two of them.
That way, you can prevent ugly situations like chronic tendonitis from happening. Chronic tendonitis is when there is an uncontrolled and non-inflammatory worsening of the condition of the tendons around the wrist.
Bowling usually doesn’t pose any serious issue to the wrist. But then, in certain conditions, the injuries worsen.
Some of these conditions include the age of the individual, the rate of blood flow to the affected region, the degree of elasticity of the affected region, pre-existing conditions like diabetes, thyroid diseases, rheumatoid arthritis, etc.
Why does my arm hurt after bowling?
The arm is connected to the shoulder joint. And the bowling involves a repeated motion of the muscles around the shoulder joint. As a result, you feel pain along your arm after bowling. You can prevent this by going through with slight warm-up exercises before bowling. Stretch your arms and legs fully and then, you are ready to go.
Another factor that could be responsible for a hurting arm is the kind of weight you are lifting. Note that bowling balls are much heavier than duck pins. The moment you begin to feel pain along your arm, switch to duck pins. That way, the muscles in your arms do not have to exert much force in the lifting of items.
Middle and ring finger pain after bowling
Most times, pain will only arise along the middle and ring finger when a person bowls too frequently. As a result, there is an increase in pressure on the nerves in the wrist as well as an increase in the friction along the region. This condition is usually regarded as the Bowler’s thumb syndrome.
More of the symptoms that you’d see include the following;
Symptoms
- A numb feeling or tingling towards the end of the thumb
- Pain between the thumb and index finger
- Weakness of the thumb
- Occurrence of a tender nodule in the thumb
How can you impress treatment to your wrist in this kind of situation?
Treatment
- Take a break from bowling. If the issue is mild, your muscles can have time to heal.
- It could also be that the grips within your bowling ball are too small. You should either have this issue corrected or have the ball replaced.
- While bowling, ensure that your fingers are well protected. There are guards and splints that can be worn atop your fingers to protect them.
You could also use tapes coated with zinc oxide to protect your fingers.
If these measures do not work to get rid of the pain, your doctor may recommend surgery. The process would involve the adjustment of the nerves so that it isn’t under too much pressure.
Related:
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