every time i play my guitar for more than an hour or so at a time i get a sharp pain in my wrist. it happened last summer and it got increasingly worst to the point i couldnt even play my guitar cause my wrist hurt to bad. my docter gave me some pills, i dont remember what they were, but i took them for a week and quit playing guitar for over a month and it went away, after that i never played as much as i did cause i was always busy. but just over the past week ive been playing a lot more and within a few days the sharp pain is coming back when i play for half an hour or so. its not on the picking hand but the one i use for chords and stuff. the pain feels similar to when you hyper extend a finger or something but it starts out light and progressivly gets worst every time i play. anyone know what this could be?
corporal tunnel or tendonitis? try getting 1 of those wrist splint things for cor[poral tunnel, it may restrict your dexterity while playin so you'll not be as good, but try it alot when u statrt feelin it, to retrain your wrist possition and all does massage help? diggin in and rolling the tendon till it loosens up?
i dont think its carpal tunnel, from what ive heard carpal tunnel is more of a tingeling or numbing feeling in the fingers, and im just feeling a sharp pain at the joint in my wrist. it might be tendonitis
do you also have pain in your elbow and/or shoulder at anytime? hows your posture while playing and throughout the day? and true tendonitis is quite rare
i dont have any pains in my elbow or shoulder, its just in my wrist. i play with my guitar above my waist and i try to keep my thumb around the middle of the neck, which i think is considered the "proper" posture for the guitar. ive tried massaging and stretching out my fingers and stuff, it helps a little but usually just taking a break from playing for a few hours helps the most.
As a musician who has dealt with similar problems for years I can tell you there is no drug that is going to solve your problem and any rehab type of therapy is going to be difficult, long term and expensive. Some people have more resilliance in their muscles and connective tissues than others. I think you are simply over-playing your capacity. Pain is a sign that you have gone too far for a long time. You may have to give it up entirely for a while to recover and then when you get back to it you'll have to be gentle and careful and never play to the point of pain again. "No pain no gain" does not apply here. If you continue you will just be making things worse and will need longer and longer recovery times. I once heard of a great jazz pianist who had gotten to the point where he could only play like one hour per month. You've got to cut back. I somewhat deal with mine by playing several different instruments and thereby using different muscle groups. It's very frustrating because I can never get really good at any of them. I have also taken up composing to get around it. It's not as fun but you do what you've got to do.
do you really think theres not much i can do about it? i dont think im over playing that much, i play mabey a couple hours a day at most. do you think my wrist just cant handle it or something. ive been planning on getting a music degree and making a living off giving private guitar lessons for a while, so its really important to me to find out whats happening, if its not something that will heal im probably gonna give up on being real serious about my guitar playing cause if i play a lot it hurts like shit.
