if you are someone who is thinking about using a mobility aid and have never previously used one PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE get a professional to help you choose the right one if possible.
I have been a mobility aid user, and more specifically a forearm crutch user for about 5 years nows and here recently I have been working a lot and at my job I have only really been able to use one of my crutches because I often need to use one hand. but because of that I was using one crutch and trying to make up for the pain on both sides of my body and was putting almost all of my body weight/pressure on the side with my crutch.
because of that I had basically woke up sometime this week and had a bit of shoulder pain, I didn't think much of it until the pain came back about 5x worse at night. I couldn't move my arm up except for a few inches, if someone touched my shoulder I was in agonizing pain, I just thought maybe it was my normal joint pain but was a bit more intense this time.
the next day I was still in a significant amount of pain and debated back and forth on if I should see a doctor or not because what if it was just my chronic pain, but I decided to go anyways.
I had gone to see ortho because I knew they had my records and might know what's wrong. I get there and explain my symptoms then they tell me they wanna get some x-rays. I got the x-rays and waited for the results to come back, the doctor came into the room and showed me my x-rays. she showed me that the bones in my neck weren't curving like a normal neck, but because of the muscle strain and spasms that I was having they were going straight up and down.
so because of the amount of support I need and was having to use it only I one side I sustained a neck injury. so now I have to go to physical therapy because of a pinched nerve in my neck and significant muscle spasms that are the cause of my shoulder pain.
all of this to say, please get professional input and make sure you're using it right, it could save you so much pain and future issues.
