pulled inner thigh muscle

so I pulled a muscle (I think) in my inner thigh (right leg) last night. it happened during a roll (by "roll" I mean ukemi, not the BJJ term for newaza randori), but the roll didn't seem abnormal in any way, it was just a "hey I'm waiting for class to start, so I'm gonna roll over there" type thing. I knew as soon as my leg hit the ground that something was wrong, and by the end of class it was really hurting pretty bad. it was so bad that I just completely gave up and got off the mat during a newaza randori session (those who have trained with me know that something has to be pretty bad for me to fully get off the mat).

now I've pulled a groin muscle before, but that felt different. in that case the pain was up at the very top of my thigh and into my lower stomach, and was extremely painful for 3 months. this is pretty much right at the middle of my thigh, and not quite as painful as the other time.

what do I do to get back to training painlessly as soon as possible? I'd ask my doctor, but I no longer have health insurance. I'm skipping my BJJ class tonight, and may be skipping tomorrow's judo class as well (seems like an obvious choice) but what else should I do? and furthermore how long should I stay off the mat to allow it to heal?

ice massage, rest, compression (a good old ACE bandage), and the usual care is the only thing I can suggest. I wouldn't go back until you're not feeling pain in regular movement.

If the pain doesn't get better in a couple of days, you really need to see a doctor. If you've torn something, the more you walk around on it, the worse it's going to get, especially if it's a partial tear.

genetic judoka wrote:so I pulled a muscle (I think) in my inner thigh (right leg) last night. it happened during a roll (by "roll" I mean ukemi, not the BJJ term for newaza randori), but the roll didn't seem abnormal in any way, it was just a "hey I'm waiting for class to start, so I'm gonna roll over there" type thing. I knew as soon as my leg hit the ground that something was wrong, and by the end of class it was really hurting pretty bad. it was so bad that I just completely gave up and got off the mat during a newaza randori session (those who have trained with me know that something has to be pretty bad for me to fully get off the mat).

now I've pulled a groin muscle before, but that felt different. in that case the pain was up at the very top of my thigh and into my lower stomach, and was extremely painful for 3 months. this is pretty much right at the middle of my thigh, and not quite as painful as the other time.

what do I do to get back to training painlessly as soon as possible? I'd ask my doctor, but I no longer have health insurance. I'm skipping my BJJ class tonight, and may be skipping tomorrow's judo class as well (seems like an obvious choice) but what else should I do? and furthermore how long should I stay off the mat to allow it to heal?

I would normally ask you additional question such as precisely which muscle(s) and where exactly, what distance up from your knee and/or down from your hip bone. The reason is to identify whether it is really 'just' an inner thigh muscle or one of the muscles that one can consider still as part of your groin and whether the problem/pain runs all the way to the tendon. Reason is that if it is truly a groin injury far more caution is necessary in the rehabilitation approach since healing of groin injuries is notoriously difficult. One of the reasons is that you can't really unload them unless you lie down, and even then it is not absolute guarantee since one can pull a groin muscle even in bed just by turning or even simply by flexing your muscle.

You need to give more details about precisely how the injury occurred. You describe that it happened during zenpô kaiten but you did not say whether it was hidari ZK or migi ZK, nor to which leg it happened. This is important for me to imagine the injury better. I suspect that it happened either to the right leg if it was right ZK or to the left leg when it was left ZK.

Icing in these regions only makes sense in the most acute phase to stop hemorrhage or ... if it is a chronic overload injury to reduce inflammation. Twenty-four hours after the injury, and probably even much quicker you can already start applying heat. You should do so before use too. Compression is important too but difficult to achieve since there are some very powerful muscles in your thigh and you cannot properly compress a single muscle.It would require as strong adhesive wide tape, but this causes major problems because of pain of removing it due to hair on your legs, and social issues since particularly in the US people are very sensitive to BO and you will probably want to shower multiple times per day. This doesn't work well with this approach since such and adhesive tape really should remain on there for 5-7 days.

So I will assume that this is not an option. This brings us to another problem particularly for those living in America, which I have detailed many times before on the old forum. Applying twice per day anti-inflammatory/Antiphlogistic ointments is the normal ways forward and will help your healing. But unfortunately the FDA's (very strange) view on this none of these things are on the market in the US. So unless you have access to a Canadian, Mexican or other pharmacy ... this is a problem. Sure you can order these from abroad on the Internet, but I suppose your injury may not be that serious and may be healed by the time it arrives. There also may be legal risks since customs are not fond of citizens ordering medical drugs abroad as it is considered a way to circumvent national or state law.

In absence of that, warm baths, lots of sleep are the way to go. I also strongly recommend to be a weenie rather than a macho. Be at the safe side, walk away trying if you already can; don't. These type of injuries do not respond well to exercise that is started to early. Your first exercise should be cycling, only then running because running 'carries' you and is harder due to shocking. Contact sports or judo should be the last thing you try since you now have an external load.

When starting judo avoid everything that produces shocks or loading on that leg. Abstain from performing zenpô kaiten for weeks, under no circumstances uchi-mata with loading on that leg. If it is your right leg, time to try throws to the left. Do not exceed the pain barrier under any circumstances. Be safe, exaggerate even. That's all I can say based on the information you have provided. For the rest, don't grab for any orally administered drugs. Ibuprophen is not going to do much as these injuries do not hurt that hard if you do not use the leg and it won't do anything to the injury itself.

thank you ck and stacey. very helpful info, as always. for reference it was a left ZK ukemi, and my right leg that's hurting (it says so in the OP). it's already much better than it was when it happened, but it still hurts when I'm getting out of my car.

on a related note, my gymnast friend showed me a picture of his injured inner thigh muscle, and it kinda made me feel like a sissy for complaining about my own:

I'm thinking his was more than just a "pull". his happened over the summer and he says it still hurts.

genetic judoka wrote:thank you ck and stacey. very helpful info, as always. for reference it was a left ZK ukemi, and my right leg that's hurting (it says so in the OP). it's already much better than it was when it happened, but it still hurts when I'm getting out of my car.

on a related note, my gymnast friend showed me a picture of his injured inner thigh muscle, and it kinda made me feel like a sissy for complaining about my own:

I'm thinking his was more than just a "pull". his happened over the summer and he says it still hurts.

Not necessarily. I know it's picture from a male but if that were a female it would have even been worse since blood vessels of females are closer to the skin and more fragile thus much greater hemorrhages. If I pull a muscle I virtually never have a visible bruise, thus there is a lot of interindividual difference. Some people bruise a lot, others don't. It isn't necessary that the bruise in that picture is completely caused by the pulled muscle itself; it may be a consequence of other capillaries that also ended up being torn. A bruise can also be exacerbated by wrong treatment. It won't be the first case where I heard someone immediately applied heat and warm baths after a bruise hence the bleeding increasing even much more and ending up in pretty gros results.

it's not so much the bruising, but the "there's a baseball sized lump on his inner thigh, that also has a bruise on it" aspect that gets me about that picture.