Training w/ Broken Nose

I broke my nose at Judo practice yesterday. I sat out for a minute or two and then finished the last 30 minutes because I didn’t realize it was broken yet. Today when I woke up I realized it was hella crooked and scheduled a doctor’s appointment. I also went to the gym for squat day and felt fine, just a bit light headed.
What is your experience with training through a broken nose? I talked to my mom (who is a nurse), and she was concerned that I might also have had a concussion.

stick some tissue in there tape it up and rub some dirt on it
if that fails

go buy a face guard and a aset of ear guards- cliff keen makes some

I wore one for a few weeks three separate times it let me go to practice and have college matches.
once for a broken nose two other times for stitches

if you have a concussion it can be far more serious
then a crooked ass nose

[quote]kmcnyc wrote:
stick some tissue in there tape it up and rub some dirt on it
if that fails

go buy a face guard and a aset of ear guards- cliff keen makes some

I wore one for a few weeks three separate times it let me go to practice and have college matches.
once for a broken nose two other times for stitches

if you have a concussion it can be far more serious
then a crooked ass nose[/quote]

Ya I wasn’t worried about it until I talked to my mom and she freaked out. I will check out options for faceguards. Thanks

Get the head looked at. Concussion is a serious matter. You would be wise to stay away from getting bashed in the head for a week or two if you haven’t got one. If you have got a concussion, you’ll want to wait a lot longer. I trained and fought through all sorts of injuries in my fighting day. My only rule, and the only one I try and force on my fighters, is to never take chances with your brain.

If your head is pounding days after sparring, or you’ve been concussed, or are in any doubt, then leave well alone. It’s a long life to be a vegetable, and unless you’re making big bucks from your career, you should never take any chances with your mind.

The nose is trivial. Try and straighten it yourself or get someone who knows what they are doing to do it, like your mum. It’s all cartilage really, so there is no reason to let it set crooked, unless you like being ugly. My uncle is a world class nose resetter. He’s a former fighter, rather than a nurse or doctor or what have you. I’ve had mine busted 4 times, and you wouldn’t know it to look at me.

[quote]LondonBoxer123 wrote:
Get the head looked at. Concussion is a serious matter. You would be wise to stay away from getting bashed in the head for a week or two if you haven’t got one. If you have got a concussion, you’ll want to wait a lot longer. I trained and fought through all sorts of injuries in my fighting day. My only rule, and the only one I try and force on my fighters, is to never take chances with your brain.

If your head is pounding days after sparring, or you’ve been concussed, or are in any doubt, then leave well alone. It’s a long life to be a vegetable, and unless you’re making big bucks from your career, you should never take any chances with your mind.

The nose is trivial. Try and straighten it yourself or get someone who knows what they are doing to do it, like your mum. It’s all cartilage really, so there is no reason to let it set crooked, unless you like being ugly. My uncle is a world class nose resetter. He’s a former fighter, rather than a nurse or doctor or what have you. I’ve had mine busted 4 times, and you wouldn’t know it to look at me. [/quote]

Thanks. Went to the doctor, she said I didn’t have a concussion but they took x rays and my nose is definitely broken. They told me they’d reset it after the swelling went down (?). Not too worried about aesthetics, as I wasn’t Brad Pitt or anything in the first place.

In that case you’re all good. You’re lucky you aren’t in a sport where breathing through your nose and staying conscious are closely linked.

[quote]RonSwanson wrote:

[quote]LondonBoxer123 wrote:
Get the head looked at. Concussion is a serious matter. You would be wise to stay away from getting bashed in the head for a week or two if you haven’t got one. If you have got a concussion, you’ll want to wait a lot longer. I trained and fought through all sorts of injuries in my fighting day. My only rule, and the only one I try and force on my fighters, is to never take chances with your brain.

If your head is pounding days after sparring, or you’ve been concussed, or are in any doubt, then leave well alone. It’s a long life to be a vegetable, and unless you’re making big bucks from your career, you should never take any chances with your mind.

The nose is trivial. Try and straighten it yourself or get someone who knows what they are doing to do it, like your mum. It’s all cartilage really, so there is no reason to let it set crooked, unless you like being ugly. My uncle is a world class nose resetter. He’s a former fighter, rather than a nurse or doctor or what have you. I’ve had mine busted 4 times, and you wouldn’t know it to look at me. [/quote]

Thanks. Went to the doctor, she said I didn’t have a concussion but they took x rays and my nose is definitely broken. They told me they’d reset it after the swelling went down (?). Not too worried about aesthetics, as I wasn’t Brad Pitt or anything in the first place.[/quote]

Who wants to look like Brad Pitt anyway? However, recurring injury to the nose after a break can lead to respiratory problems down the line. Blockages, damaged cartilage, weakness etc. Just let it heal. I think what London says about weighing up the risk/reward to training is correct. If you don’t have something big on the line, then let your snout heal for a while. That isn’t an excuse to let your conditioning go for a ball of chalk! Consider a patched up and stuffy broken nose as “Gas mask” training, if you like.

One of my old Judo coaches showed me the best way to re-set the nose. He did it for me and my team-mates on several occasions and it worked way better than whenever I got a doctor to do it. Get two of those cheap flexible-type ballpoint pen tubes, and cut them off so they’re about the length of your nose. Push the tapered ends up into your nose as you blow out all the blood and snot and junk, until you clear out your airways so you can breathe on both sides. Leave them in there a few days while your nose sets and you’re golden. Kind of messy but it works great, and you can kind of breathe instead of having all that gauze jammed up there.

And like everyone else said, make sure you don’t have a concussion. Unless you’re getting paid to fight you should take some time off to heal up.

[quote]Jelly Roll wrote:
One of my old Judo coaches showed me the best way to re-set the nose. He did it for me and my team-mates on several occasions and it worked way better than whenever I got a doctor to do it. Get two of those cheap flexible-type ballpoint pen tubes, and cut them off so they’re about the length of your nose. Push the tapered ends up into your nose as you blow out all the blood and snot and junk, until you clear out your airways so you can breathe on both sides. Leave them in there a few days while your nose sets and you’re golden. Kind of messy but it works great, and you can kind of breathe instead of having all that gauze jammed up there.

And like everyone else said, make sure you don’t have a concussion. Unless you’re getting paid to fight you should take some time off to heal up.[/quote]

No offense and I am normally all for DIY health, but I reckon the best advice after any injury that causes damage or breakage of bone or cartilage is to see a professional doctor. That’s my 2c on that issue.

[quote]LondonBoxer123 wrote:
Get the head looked at. Concussion is a serious matter. You would be wise to stay away from getting bashed in the head for a week or two if you haven’t got one. If you have got a concussion, you’ll want to wait a lot longer. I trained and fought through all sorts of injuries in my fighting day. My only rule, and the only one I try and force on my fighters, is to never take chances with your brain.

If your head is pounding days after sparring, or you’ve been concussed, or are in any doubt, then leave well alone. It’s a long life to be a vegetable, and unless you’re making big bucks from your career, you should never take any chances with your mind.
[/quote]

How long do you reccomend taking off full contact training after a concussion? Does this length of time change depending on the severity of the concussion?

If you get KO’d, I would take at least 3 months without any kind of head trauma - ie sparring. I was never knocked out, so I can’t comment on it from personal experience. I have been beat up a few times in the ring though, and I have taken weeks of sparring afterwards, sometimes more than a month.

I am not a doctor and have no medical training beyond basic first aid. I recommend consulting your doctor, and disregarding what they say if it sounds excessively stupid (happens regularly when they find out you box).

I have refused to spar a friend for several months for his own good after he got battered and stopped. I would also not allow any fighter I was responsible for to head spar at least three months, perhaps more depending on the fighter. I would encourage body sparring to regain confidence, and I would increase the time I spent on the pads with them.

Re-building confidence after a knockout seems to be very difficult for a lot of fighters. Anyone who has been knocked out owes it to themselves to seriously analyse why it happened, and what they can do to avoid it. It is controversial in the fight game, but I have advised several fighters to go up a weight class to improve their punch resistance, and it has helped.

THIS IS NOT AN ENCOURAGEMENT TO ALL THE INTERNET TOUGH GUYS TO START A LOAD OF THREADS TITLED ‘I WANT TO BE 200lbs AND FUCKING INVINCIBLE BRO’. These were decent fighters, with a future in the sport, who were drying out too much to make the weight.

If you are getting regularly sparked out in the Ams, then you are either being over matched and need to change gyms, drying out too much to make weight, or are flat out not suited to the sport. You owe it to yourself to workout which. Anyone can get dropped occasionally if they get sloppy. More than once or twice - something else is wrong.

Aside from pad work and boy sparing what can be done to maintain, timing and accuracy in the 3 month down time?

Maintain? Nothing. Time away from sparring will inevitably lead to ‘ring rust’. However, like strength, the principle applies: the higher your peak ability at the point you stop for a period, the higher your base line ability will be.

This is a sport, where most people don’t make it to pro level, and those that do tend to have a fairly shitty time of it unless they make it to the elite level. As an amateur, you are unlikely to be fighting for a significant prize on the back of a knockout. If you get stopped in the championships, or lose at all, you’re out. Your next fight is a club fight. You can afford to take 3 months of sparring. Use the time to develop your other attributes. Push conditioning, work on strength, practise new combinations on the pads and bags, double your shadow boxing.* Put yourself in a position to come back better than before - once you are back in the ring, you will get your skills back fairly quickly (weeks, not months).

A concussion is a significant brain injury. To me, that ranks higher than broken bones, bad cuts, muscle damage etc in the ‘oh fuck’ stakes. Treat it with the seriousness it deserves, it isn’t a recurring injury you want.

*I bang this drum like crazy here, but if you are shadow boxing PROPERLY - ie visualising fighting an opponent, and have fight experience, I think it is possible to improve aspects of your boxing without sparring.

Thanks for your input.

[quote]Jelly Roll wrote:
One of my old Judo coaches showed me the best way to re-set the nose. He did it for me and my team-mates on several occasions and it worked way better than whenever I got a doctor to do it. Get two of those cheap flexible-type ballpoint pen tubes, and cut them off so they’re about the length of your nose. Push the tapered ends up into your nose as you blow out all the blood and snot and junk, until you clear out your airways so you can breathe on both sides. Leave them in there a few days while your nose sets and you’re golden. Kind of messy but it works great, and you can kind of breathe instead of having all that gauze jammed up there.

And like everyone else said, make sure you don’t have a concussion. Unless you’re getting paid to fight you should take some time off to heal up.[/quote]