writerly pain
Not the existential pain of producing creativity and scholarship. No. I’m talking about the physical pain that comes from typing and mousework and sitting on one’s tuckus for hours and hours and years and years. It seems like at least a couple of times a year I read blog posts about these sorts of injuries. Yesterday, in fact, I wrote a long email to such a blogger to let her know what was working for me. So it seems like it’s worth putting it here in the hopes of being helpful to future googlers.
Establishing some ethos: my pain began back in 2001, when I was doing a lot of desk work that involved repetitive mousing and talking on the phone. It got progressively worse through my graduate work, and by the time I hit my Ph.D. coursework I was worried about finishing semesters on time because of the pain. Since then, I’ve worked with a physical therapist, a massage therapist, and a chiropractor, as well as modified my desk setup quite a bit. I found out a few tricks in the course of all that. (It’s long and not of interest to all my readers, so I’ll tuck it beneath the fold.)
Dorothea Salo’s posts on RSI also hold a wealth of information, much of it different and more detailed than what I’m writing here. You should definitely click through on that link. The best thing you can do for yourself is something both of us ultimately did: find a good physical therapist who will take you seriously and address your pain. If the first person you go to doesn’t do that, find another one. And when you find a good one, do as you’re told.