Home Forums Other Topics Why does God hate me?

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    • #22383
      Byron
      Participant

      It seems like every time I get ready to really take off and get going with my music, something happens to take me out of the game.

      Personal problems. Work. Moving. Home repairs. A band that had the rug pulled out from under it just as we were starting to take off. (The a-hole who did it has a history and habit of doing that.) A hard drive crash that caused the loss of YEARS worth of material. (Fortunetely, I was able to recover much of it from memory.)

      A number of years ago, I developed a shoulder injury (as a result of not warming up properly ) that left me barely able to hold a pick for over a month.

      Now I have a rather nasty case of Medial Epicondylitis ( Golfer’s Elbow) on my fretting arm.

    • #22384
      Byron
      Participant

      Medial Epicondylitis is the same as tennis elbow, but on the inside. I have had that a couple of times before, but it was rather mild and went away after a couple of weeks. This is being stubborn. A large part of the recovery process is rest, but unfortunately everything I do in my life involves using that same muscle group. Heavily. In fact, anything that uses the wrist flexors at all (meaning a continued mortal existance of any usefulness whatsoever) exacerbates the condition. Which means that as an upright primate with an opposable thumb, I am doomed.

      This happens just as my wife/ co-conspirator/ partner-in-crime/ musical partner and I are putting together some stuff. Including a song we co wrote in a couple of days during Harvey and inspired by it (him?). I had grand designs of recording and mixing it during the ensuing week, but it just ain’t happenin’.

      Now, I’m certainly not above recording all the parts in pieces, one section at a time, but even that is proving difficult. A few minutes of playing and my elbow is on fire. Bass is particularly excruciating.

      And it doesn’t help a bit that in the evenings when I get home it is sore after using it all day at work.

    • #22385
      Byron
      Participant

      I suppose if there is to be a point to all this perceveration, it is: TAKE CARE OF YOURSELF. And, furthermore, LISTEN TO WHAT YOUR BODY IS TELLING YOU!

      Now, my wife/ co-conspirator/ partner-in-crime/ musical partner can certainly attest to the fact that I don’t do the listening part very well. I think it was actually yard work that brought this on, coupled with a fairly high tolerance for pain and a tendency to work through it.

    • #22386
      Byron
      Participant

      Arrgh! It’s not letting me post the rest!

    • #22387
      superblonde
      Keymaster

      Sorry to hear it..
      I was talking to a local pro blues guitarist who recently sent out in his newsletter, that he had to cancel his upcoming 6 week European tour because of a severe warning from his doctors about his back problem. Which, he doesn’t know how his disc stuff happened, and could only guess that maybe it was from years of leaning over his guitar, or in recent years, lugging his gear. (He plays solo, so has to carry everything himself.) Supposedly the story from his doctors (my 2nd hand interpretation) was that flying in a plane could end up rupturing something because of reduced pressure at high altitude. I think he’s in his 50s. More unfortunately for him, cancelling the tour is a big hit to his income, since he doesn’t have local gigs scheduled during that time, and has to scramble to make up for it. I should have saved some of his old email gig newsletters because he literally was playing 7 nights a week all around town, 3-4 hours, a very hard working musician (in addition to recording and producing his own CD’s, etc).

      It seems that “injury from musical instrument” is much more common than might be expected..

      Also recently reading a prior interview with Bumblefoot where he grudgingly told his ‘wanted to kill myself from the pain’ story, he had a few very bad medical problems that he didn’t treat for a long time (and didn’t tell anyone about) because he felt it was important to keep the GnR train going, rather than worry about himself. He ended up having surgery in some very short window of time and then flying out to start tour again just a few days later. Just crazy insane, to read that. Especially even more insane because he plays a double neck guitar during his shows that weighs 20 lbs or something.

      I find that common sense advise “listen to your body” very difficult to follow as well. I don’t get aches & pains while keeping up a yoga habit. For a long while I’ve let yoga slide. Both my shoulder and my picking arm elbow has been telling me, I better start doing yoga, daily, before playing guitar, or else. Ultimately I would like to get to a point of musicianship where I don’t necessarily have to be playing an instrument (unless I want to), to do something musical. There’s so many examples of this.. people composing music while being very incapable of playing. Putting that skill into the mix (composing by inner ear, I guess), I think could lessen a lot of the body impact, by allowing the rest time. I guess that level of skill takes a long while to develop.
      Maybe this topic is a good example for how musicians get addicted to pain meds, which is another physical downfall. Somewhere there is a middle ground. I am definitely more on the “gung ho, ignore the aches” side of things which like you say is definitely not the way to go, long term.

      MAB told a story at his recent clinic. About how his wrist had been dislocated for decades and he didn’t know it was dislocated, only that, he couldn’t bend it all the way back without it hurting. (His fretting hand I believe.) Yet he still played guitar all this time, including the double guitar. He said (I believe) that he probably dislocated it way back in the 80s when working out using free weights with friends from Golds Gym in Hollywood (flashback to the Star Licks days). This is a surprising story from MAB since he always emphasizes avoiding injury, and has been lucky enough to avoid getting hurt. Anyway, he got it checked just by coincidence, got this diagnosed, and had his wrist popped back in (owww!) and he can move it fully now. The take away for me is that sometimes we are hurt and don’t even know it. So it’s good to pay attention.

      On the flip side of this argument I went to the doctor and asked if there was any brief exam which he could do to check my back, just as a reference point, and considering my genetics (which includes likely back problems). He shrugged and said: um, no. So yeah, back to the yoga.

      I think this is an important topic because the average age of metal method students is well into adulthood. I don’t think there’s anybody here who is a preteen and skipping school to practice guitar 12 hrs a day and shaking that off from youthfulness immediately the next day.

      I'm an intermediate student of Metal Method. I play seitannic heavy metal. All Kale Seitan! ♯ ♮ ♭ ø ° Δ ♩ ♪ ♫ ♬
      And on the Seventh Day, Mustaine said: ∇ ⨯ E = - ∂B / ∂t ; and there was Thrash; and it had a ♭3; and it was good.

    • #22388
      superblonde
      Keymaster

      Maybe the more obvious response is, god hates you because you listen to devil music. \m/ \m/

      I'm an intermediate student of Metal Method. I play seitannic heavy metal. All Kale Seitan! ♯ ♮ ♭ ø ° Δ ♩ ♪ ♫ ♬
      And on the Seventh Day, Mustaine said: ∇ ⨯ E = - ∂B / ∂t ; and there was Thrash; and it had a ♭3; and it was good.

    • #22389
      MotleyCrue81
      Participant

      I blew out my elbow throwing javelin in college, it effected my throwing during baseball significantly haha… Took about two years before it was completely back to normal (yes, elbows CAN get better!) It never really effected my guitar playing though, maybe cause it was only my picking hand and I don’t do a lot of acoustic style strumming. I’ve always been pretty hardy and injury free, but everyone gets something eventually. Human bodies are pretty good at healing if the right things are done, though. I used a lot of gels, creams, etc., did some exercises to help it, and made sure I didn’t do anything to stress it. All I can say is hang in there and take the necessary steps to heal. It won’t get better tomorrow, but it will get better. Do what you can with guitar, just make sure you stay in your limits until everything is all better.

      Bring hair metal back!

    • #22390
      superblonde
      Keymaster

      Altho Motley you might have some youth on your side, hah.

      And if anyone really want to hate themselves even more, while resting an elbow, try the ear training quiz every day https://guitarlessonforum.com/guitar-forums/topic/test-your-ear-intervals-go-ahead-i-dare-you After a little bit of that misery, the pain from the elbow won’t be so noticeable..

      I’m going to do some reading about that elbow condition just as a preventative, so this is great for Byron to have posted. I have been taking biotin vitamin for a long time which is supposed to be somewhat good, but who knows really. Recently my doc insisted (absolutely insisted) that I start taking vitamin D (5000 units) after looking at some routine lab results, which also maybe has some soft tissue related effects, so I’ve started that. Even though I get tons of sun. I’m not a big believer in supplements in general.

      Meanwhile, Ozzy is somehow still running around on stage, and the Stones too. They are in their 70s?

      This whole musician’s health thing is a big topic, I suggested to Doug a while back that it would be great to have some videos on these issues, but there’s a lot of reasons why trying to instruct or recommend anything for such stuff is asking for a lot of trouble too. Certainly the local instructor at a music school I went to had nothing to say on this topic (other than, “earplugs are in the plastic bucket up front, they are $1 per pair”), and even signing up for lessons there required signing a huge disclaimer-no-liability fine print document.

      I'm an intermediate student of Metal Method. I play seitannic heavy metal. All Kale Seitan! ♯ ♮ ♭ ø ° Δ ♩ ♪ ♫ ♬
      And on the Seventh Day, Mustaine said: ∇ ⨯ E = - ∂B / ∂t ; and there was Thrash; and it had a ♭3; and it was good.

    • #22393
      Byron
      Participant

      I”m finding that ood posture is helping me in trying to stay loose and relaxed.

      Frequent breaks help a lot, too.

      And no, raking up an acre worth of leaves is not a break. If anything, it is WORSE on the wrist flexors.

    • #22394
      Byron
      Participant

      Maybe God doesn’t hate me after all. Maybe he is just slapping me upside the head to get me to pay attention and save myself from myself.

      And as my wife/ co-conspirator/ partner-in-crime/ musical partner can certainly attest to, slapping me upside the head is sometimes the only way to get me to pay attention.

    • #22397
      Byron
      Participant

      Maybe the more obvious response is, god hates you because you listen to devil music. \m/ \m/

      Even if it is Christian Blackened Country Grinding Deathcore?

    • #22407
      Doug Marks
      Keymaster

      A couple of months ago I was playing too much golf and started to radically improve.  Then, I noticed an increase in floaters in one of my eyes and went to the ophthalmologist. The following day was a tournament that I had been looking forward to for weeks.  After examining my eye he sat down in front of me and said, “First of all, you’re ok.”  I said, “I hear a but in there someplace.”  He said, “Have you ever heard of a vitreous detachment?”  I said, “Not until now.”  He explained and followed that with, “Only do activities that you could do holding a glass of water without spilling anything.”  That was followed by a month free of golf.  I’m better now but it often seems right when I’m ready to break through to a higher level that I’m challenged by something.

      Metal Method Guitar Instructor

    • #22410
      Byron
      Participant

      There are some new-agey type thinkers who say that road blocks are a sign that you are getting close to your goal.

    • #22415
      superblonde
      Keymaster

      You know Doug, when Rimbaud and Huxley suggested a systematic derangement of the senses to unlock the Doors of Perception, (often quoted by Jim Morrison), I’m not sure this is what he had in mind.

      I'm an intermediate student of Metal Method. I play seitannic heavy metal. All Kale Seitan! ♯ ♮ ♭ ø ° Δ ♩ ♪ ♫ ♬
      And on the Seventh Day, Mustaine said: ∇ ⨯ E = - ∂B / ∂t ; and there was Thrash; and it had a ♭3; and it was good.

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