Shoulder from Its Socket

The horse went down and the rein was wrapped twice around your fist, and the wrench took the arm from its socket and kept pulling. The capsule tore and the great nerve that wakes the shoulder was stretched like a fiddle string. The doctor works the bone home with laudanum and a long slow pull, but the arm hangs from you like a stranger's, numb across its outer face, the deltoid slack and silent. He says the nerve may wake in weeks or months, and that a shoulder hurt this deep is never quite trusted with a rope again.

• The right arm is a dead weight, strapped to the body, no use of it at all for 21 days
• No feeling along the outer shoulder, you cannot tell a touch from a burn there, mind it around stove and fire
• No riding, no roping, no firearms in the right hand until the doctor finds life in the deltoid again
• /me stands with the right arm strapped dead across the body, the shoulder sitting wrong under the shirt

Recovery Three weeks strapped, then months coaxing the arm awake, if it chooses to wake at all.·Doctor, urgently

You came off over the horse's head and landed on the point of the shoulder, and the ball left its socket and took a chip of the rim along with it. The doctor feels bone grate on bone as he draws the arm home, and his face goes careful. He binds the arm to your body and says the chip must knit where it lies, and that if it does not, the shoulder will let go someday with no fall needed at all.

• Left arm bound to the chest, no use of it for 14 days while the chipped rim knits
• Nothing heavier than a coffee cup in the left hand for a month after the binding comes off
• Sleeping propped on the right side only, the bound arm uppermost, for 2 weeks
• /me turns the whole body to look left, the bound arm pinned beneath the coat

Recovery Two weeks bound to the body, a month more before the joint bears weight, the grate fading slowly.·Doctor required

It went out in the morning far from anywhere, and you rode home cradling the arm through the whole hot day while the muscle set like mortar around the misplaced ball. By lamplight the doctor pours laudanum into you and leans back on the wrist in one long patient pull, a quarter hour of it, until the shoulder sighs and lets the bone slide home. The joint is swollen tight as a saddle swell and twice as angry.

• The shoulder is swollen tight and hot, cold well-water cloths every few hours for 3 days
• Arm slung for 12 days, no reaching above the collarbone
• Laudanum drowse tonight, no watch duty and no firearms handling until morning
• /me sits heavy and slow, the slung arm cradled, eyes glassy with laudanum

Recovery Twelve days slung, a week for the swelling, full reach not for a month.·Doctor required

The first pull failed. So did the second, and your scream chased the dogs off the porch. On the third the doctor wrapped your wrist in a towel, braced his knee, and leaned back with his whole weight until the ball rolled home with a clunk you felt in your back teeth. Something in the muscle tore on the way in, he admits, and the arm must be kept still now or the joint will learn the road out by heart.

• Right arm strapped to the side, elbow bent across the belly, for 10 days
• Torn muscle in the shoulder, no throwing, hauling, or axe work for 3 weeks
• Whiskey for the pain, two fingers at night and no more, doctor's ration
• /me lowers into a chair one careful inch at a time, the strapped arm still as a fence post

Recovery Ten days strapped, three weeks before the torn muscle forgives a full day's work.·Doctor required

The doctor laid you flat on the floorboards, planted his stockinged heel in your armpit, took your wrist in both hands and promised to pull on three. He pulled on two, the old trick, and the ball rolled home with a clunk before you could clench against it. The relief was so sudden and so total that you laughed out loud, and then you were sick over his good rug, and he called the account square.

• Arm in a sling for 8 days, elbow kept to the ribs
• Nothing lifted above shoulder height for 2 weeks
• /me rolls the freed shoulder a careful half inch and stops right there, sweat still drying

Recovery Eight days slung, two weeks shy of full reach, the deep ache gone in a fortnight.·Doctor required

The rein wrapped your wrist and the horse spooked sideways, and the wrench took the shoulder out clean as pulling a cork. The doctor bent you over the back of a kitchen chair, let the bad arm hang, tied a flatiron to the wrist with toweling, and talked about the weather until the muscle gave up and the joint slid home on its own. The rein left a burn spiraling up your wrist as its signature.

• A rein burn spiraling the wrist, kept clean and dry under linen for 5 days
• Arm slung for 7 days, no reins in the left hand for 10
• /me flexes the burned wrist slowly inside its wrap, the slung arm tucked to the ribs

Recovery A week slung, ten days before the hand takes a rein, the burn fading alongside.·Doctor required

The wagon seat pitched you off and you met the ground twice, shoulder first and then the hand you threw out to argue with it. The shoulder came out of its socket and the wrist sprained taking the rest of the bill. The doctor turns the arm through its slow circles until the joint seats, then wraps the wrist firm, and observes that you managed two injuries with one fall, which shows economy.

• Shoulder slung for 8 days, the wrist beneath it wrapped firm for 6
• No gripping with the right hand for 5 days, no weight through the arm for 2 weeks
• /me works the wrapped wrist open and shut inside the sling, counting what the fall cost

Recovery Eight days slung for the shoulder, the wrist mended a week behind it.·Doctor required

It went back the first time with a shove against the barn wall, and you called it mended and reached for a hay bale, and it slid out again easy as a pup through a gate. The doctor seats it properly this time and straps the arm down flat, and tells you the second escape is not an accident but a habit forming, and habits in a joint are broken with stillness or not at all.

• Arm strapped, not merely slung, elbow to ribs for 10 days, no exceptions
• No reaching behind the back or above the head for 3 weeks, the joint has learned a bad road
• One shoulder out twice in an hour: any third escape goes straight to the doctor, no arguing
• /me keeps the strapped elbow welded to the ribs, turning from the hips like a man in a barrel

Recovery Ten days strapped tight, three careful weeks after, and the joint watched for a year of habit.·Doctor required

The fall took it out and the landing put it back. You felt the joint leave and return inside the same heartbeat, one deep wet click that rang up through your neck and into your back teeth. The arm answers when you call it, but it does not trust you anymore, and everything above shoulder height has become foreign country.

• Arm in a kerchief sling for working hours, 5 days
• No throwing a rope or a punch for 10 days
• /me rolls the shoulder through one slow careful circle, listening to it with the whole face

Recovery Five slung days, ten before the arm goes overhead without asking twice.·Doctor advised

It hung half out on the rim of the socket, and your friend had watched a doctor do this once, years ago, from across a room. They braced a knee in your armpit, took the wrist, and pulled slow and steady while you cursed their parentage back three generations, and the ball slipped home mid-curse. Everyone agrees a doctor should still look at it. Everyone knows you likely will not go.

• Slung for 4 days, light work only for a week after
• No lifting a saddle to a horse's back for 7 days
• /me shrugs the mended shoulder at anyone who asks after it, then regrets the shrug

Recovery Four days slung, a week of light duty, sound after that.·Doctor advised

The wrench hauled the ball to the very lip of the socket and your own muscle dragged it back, one long grinding second where the world went white at the edges and you dropped whatever you were holding. It never truly left, the doctor would say, if you asked one. It aches now like a rotten tooth, deep and patient, and it means to be consulted on everything the arm does for a while.

• A deep patient ache, no work above collarbone height for 8 days
• Carrying with the other arm only for 4 days
• /me presses the opposite hand flat over the aching shoulder and breathes through the nose

Recovery Eight days of collarbone-height living, the deep ache gone inside two weeks.·Doctor advised

You landed on the outstretched hand and the shock ran up the arm like a rod. The joint slid, hung on nothing for one sick instant, and dropped back into its cup as you rolled through the dust. By supper the bruise had come up from shoulder cap to elbow, broad as a hand and colored like weather coming.

• Bruised from shoulder cap to elbow, coats go on left arm first, and slowly, for 5 days
• No pushing wagons, stuck gates, or drunk friends with the left arm for a week
• /me eases into a coat by degrees, left arm first and slow

Recovery The bruise a week in its glory, the joint quiet again in ten days.·Doctor advised

You were dragging something heavier than sense allows, and the shoulder popped out and in with the strain like a knuckle cracking, and you sat down right where you stood with the rope still in your hand. It holds. But it clicks now when the arm turns past level, and the click has opinions about your habits.

• No hauling, dragging, or dead lifting of any kind for 10 days
• The shoulder clicks on overhead work: when it clicks, you stop, for 2 weeks
• /me turns the arm until the shoulder gives its small wet click, and goes very still

Recovery Ten days off the heavy work, the click fading out inside three weeks.·Doctor advised

The wrench was hard enough to frighten the joint but not enough to move it. The ball stayed home and every muscle around it filed a complaint. By evening the whole shoulder is stiff as a new boot, and reaching for anything on a high shelf is done with the other arm and a small prayer.

• A stiff shoulder, warm cloths at night for 3 days
• No fast draws and no hard throws for 4 days
• /me windmills the arm once to prove a point, and quietly retires from proving points

Recovery Three stiff days, sound again by the end of the week.·No doctor needed

Your boot slipped off the fence rail and you caught your whole falling weight one-handed on the top rail, and for a heartbeat the shoulder held everything you are. It held. It has been writing you letters about it ever since, delivered every time the arm goes past level.

• No hanging, climbing, or chin-height lifting for 5 days
• The grip on that side tires early for 2 days
• /me flexes the hand that caught the rail, the shoulder muttering all the way up

Recovery Five days of low lifting, forgotten inside a week.·No doctor needed

The wrench pinched something at the back door of the joint, and for a long minute the arm buzzed to the fingertips like a struck funny bone. The feeling came back grumbling, all pins and wool. Overhead reaching wakes it again, so the simple medicine is to stop reaching overhead.

• Keep the elbow below the shoulder for 6 days, overhead reaching wakes the buzzing
• If the numbness comes back and stays past a day, it is a doctor matter, no arguing
• /me shakes the arm out from the shoulder like a wet dog, chasing the last of the pins

Recovery Six days of low reaching, the buzz gone for good inside a fortnight.·Doctor advised

In the moment it was nothing, one hard yank and a curse, and you finished the day's work on it. Morning had other ideas. The shoulder set up overnight like cold molasses, and now the first hour of every day is spent buying the arm back one slow circle at a time.

• Slow stiff mornings for 4 days, no fast work before the arm is warmed
• Liniment rubbed in at night, and the whole bunkhouse will know it by the smell
• /me works the shoulder in slow circles at the morning fire, jaw set against the creak

Recovery Four stiff mornings, then it forgets, so long as you warm it before you work it.·No doctor needed

It looked bad from across the room, and two men winced on your behalf. But the joint only complained, and by the time the cards were dealt that evening you were rolling the shoulder between hands like a man winding a clock, and it came round to nothing at all. You even won the pot.

• A faint ache when rain is coming, for a week or so
• An easy day tomorrow, out of respect for the scare
• /me rolls the shoulder between hands of cards, winding it like a pocket watch

Recovery A day or two of noticing it, then nothing at all.·No doctor needed

The rein snapped taut around your sleeve instead of your wrist, and the coat seam blew out at the shoulder with a crack like a pistol. Your arm slid free of the wreck, the horse made off with half a sleeve, and the shoulder is owed nothing at all. The tailor, however, will want cash.

• The coat needs a new sleeve, the shoulder needs nothing at all
• A faint drag-line bruise across the upper arm for 2 days
• /me pokes one finger through the ruined shoulder seam and whistles at the arithmetic

Recovery Two days for the bruise line, considerably longer for the coat.·No doctor needed

Every man watching swears the arm left its socket when the horse bolted left, they heard it go. Then the horse wheeled hard back to the right, the wrapped rein snapped the other way, and the joint thocked home as your boots found the ground. Put out and put back by the same animal inside three strides. You patted its neck like it was all planned. The shoulder works better than it has in years, and the story is the finest thing you own.

• No injury at all, only a rein welt on the wrist that fades by morning
• Honor-bound to tell the story at every fire for a month, sound effects included
• /me snaps two fingers apart and back together to show how the horse took it out and put it back

Recovery Nothing to recover from, save the trembling in the knees, and that is gone by supper.·No doctor needed