Week 6 Day 6 - Contracting the calf - is this thing on?
January 30, 2017Trying not to contract the calf
I remember at first, when I was in the cast, I was pretty scared of accidentally contracting my calf muscles. In my mind, if it was stitching back together, it would only take a small amount of force to pull the ends apart again. What if I twitched in my sleep?
As the days went by though I began to obsess over the opposite question - what if they’re not joining together at all? I really wanted to contract that calf just gently to see if it caused anything to happen below the rupture site.
When you see images like this it seems baffling that just fixing the ankle downwards would be enough for the ends to meet up properly and join back together.
(I’ve since learned that the tendon is housed in a sheath, I guess that helps keep them lined up. Still seems pretty incredible to me!)
I couldn’t resist testing it, and I found that I could gently press the “pads” of my feet against the bottom of the cast, which was reassuring…Until I remembered that on the morning after I’d ruptured I’d tried exactly the same thing with the same result. That first time I thought maybe this meant it was only a partial rupture, the consultant later pointed out the obvious gap between the tendon ends.
I think what I was feeling was other synergist muscles (posterior tib or peroneals?) contracting, as the pressure was all on one side (I can’t remember which side).
I kept on driving myself mad trying to prove that I could get pressure across all the “pads” and feel the contraction in the main calf muscles. I think I could, but it took a lot of concentration.
Is this thing actually on!?
As time went on and I got into the boot I started to get a bit more confident about trying to contract. But now what I found was - I couldn’t contract it! Has my brain switched it off to protect it, have I just forgotten how to do it? I find this really interesting!
If I really concentrated I think I could contract the soleus muscle, but the gastroc was just hanging there limp.
Physio
Now my physio has asked me to do some very minimal, 5 second contractions twice a day but only with the leg straight and the foot in full plantar-flexion/equinus (out of the boot).
I’m still finding it very difficult to get any obvious contraction in the gastroc this way. She did demonstrate the movement to me but I can’t remember whether my foot was hanging off the end of the bed or not. If I do have my heel pressed against the floor I feel I have more to fight against and I can get a bit more of a contraction, so I guess that’s the way to go. Otherwise it feels like I’m not really achieving anything at all with the exercise.