Cause and Effect

Yesterday I wrote about The Domino Theory. Not what I intended to write but something I remembered when I was going to write about cause and effect.

The cause I had planned to write about was my Mallet Finger, and the effect...the changes I’ve had to make to adapt to having a crooked finger.

Last month I twisted my pinkie finger on my left hand and ruptured my extensor tendon. So my finger is permanently bent at the distal joint. I can straighten it, but it slowly bends again. Oh my god, I just had a flashback to one of my favourite movies, French Kiss.

In the movie Kevin Kline’s character has had a bit of an extensor problem of his own, not a pinkie if you know what I mean. Meg Ryan’s character is teasing him, playing with some silly replica of the Eiffel Tower, one of those toys that you push from the bottom and the toy collapses, and when released it stands up straight.

Sorry, but the scene just came to mind and I’m sitting here laughing. This is what happens when you watch a movie over and over again. But I digress.

I had hoped that after some time, when the inflammation from the injury was gone, I would be used to the shape of my finger and it would no longer hurt. Every time I catch it, or jam it, it aches.

My first concern was how I was going to manage crocheting. I have to hold my fingers differently and this has caused a strain in my ring finger so that it now aches. I hope as time passes this positioning of my fingers will become my new normal and I can work without pain.

More cause and effect, I can’t get a good grip on a jar when opening the lid. Who’d have thought your pinkie was so instrumental in getting a good grip. Part of that is pain, so I hope it eases.

Then last night was eye opener. I never knew I was such a creature of habit. I’m reading in bed, one of those oversized paper backs, and I feel a pain in my finger. Here’s where the habit part comes in. When I read I hold the book in my left hand, the bottom edge of the spine in my palm, the book resting on my three middle fingers. My thumb holds the left side open, and you got it, my pinkie holds the right. In doing that the pages of the book press on that ruptured tendon. Now I have to figure out a different system.

The injured finger swells up throughout the day so I’ve taken to sleeping with the splint on so I don’t twist it in my sleep.

It’s a little finger, who would have thought that it could become such an annoyance? It’s a good thing I’m not a ten finger typist. The last two fingers on my left hand are usually curled under and out of the way, as I type with no more than six fingers.

The damage to the finger is permanent so only time will tell if the pain will ease and I develop subtle new ways of doing things. It’s embarrassing to admit how I hurt my finger, so needless to say when the phone rang today and I was in the bathroom, I let it ring. That’s what call display is for, right?