So I got a moderately serious totally non-lifting related injury to the surrounding area of one of my eyes. I saw an ophthalmologist who recommended that I avoid powerlifting training for 4-8 weeks, as I could be risking blindness in the eye by increased intraocular pressure reopening the wound. He recommended waiting at least a few weeks before resuming lighter weight training. So in the meantime, I’m bored as hell doing LISS, static stretching, and mobility work.
What I am curious to know is if there is any way I can work around this and do any kind of strength or hypertrophy work in the meantime that will not increase the pressure in my eye.
Personally I’d say take his advice. Seriously, what happens if you don’t train for a few weeks? Lose a bit of strength/size, and probably not much. What happens if you do train and something goes wrong? You could go blind. Personally it’d be a no brainer for me.
Maybe some low weight high rep isolation exercises would help, but this advice is coming to you from a random on the internet with no medical training past a first aid course, so take that advice with a block of salt.
Theres not a lot you can do minimise intraocular pressure.
Dont wear a tight neck tie, and lift in the morning if you have to lift (pressure is lowest in the morning). But if I was you I would wait until your injury heals.
Rest up, occasional lay offs can have positive effects. You’ll be bigger and stronger than you have been before after getting back to it for a consistent period of time. In fact lay offs raise the number of type 2 B muscle fibers and reactions to training.
Eh, so looks like I was on the right track then. Figured as much, but I was hoping that those more knowledgeable than me might have a clever solution.
As far as what happened, some belligerently drunk bitch in a bar surprise attacked me (I was walking by not even expecting a fight) by smashing a glass against my face. Then her boyfriend started. Took him down quick, but the damage had been done with the glass. Sliced me up a good bit including an artery underneath the eye, which was pooling blood behind the eye. I was lucky and the blood drained out nicely, but this is why the doc was concerned about the pressure.
[quote]Apoklyps wrote:
As far as what happened, some belligerently drunk bitch in a bar surprise attacked me (I was walking by not even expecting a fight) by smashing a glass against my face. Then her boyfriend started. Took him down quick, but the damage had been done with the glass. Sliced me up a good bit including an artery underneath the eye, which was pooling blood behind the eye. I was lucky and the blood drained out nicely, but this is why the doc was concerned about the pressure.[/quote]
Bitches be crazy.
You probably have a case of a bit of uveitis which is the inflammation of the eye globe. Its a tricky situation and difficult to treat. I am guessing you are taking some steroid eye drops which can also have the effect of increasing pressure.There are currently no standard testament for the treatment of raised intraocular pressure in uveitis. Intraocular pressure elevation may be due to any combination of several mechanisms and, as a result, the prognosis differs from treating high pressures in cases of glaucoma. Just be happy that in your case it is acute and not chronic, so with time things will return to normal.