To my broken up peeps....how do you keep up?

[Caw]

Last winter I shattered my shoulder skiing with the kids so we didn't finish until May with a lot of help from family and friends. My wife is a beast with the 28" Fiskars! I'm having shoulder arthroscopy in February on the same shoulder to clean it up, it's still bothering me, so we'll be late again. I'm getting my first log delivery tomorrow so I'm going to try and get it done pre surgery. Worst case it'll at least be bucked.

Having been injured for 2 winters now it's definitely annoying. I just try to find days where I can do whatever amount of work and stop when I need to stop. It's all you can do. It may just take longer. I'm hoping next year I'll finally have a full burning season of good health!

 

[Stelcom66]

Last winter I shattered my shoulder skiing with the kids so we didn't finish until May with a lot of help from family and friends....

Wow, sorry to hear. Especially doing what we do. Nice that your wife can pitch in.

 

[Caw]

Wow, sorry to hear. Especially doing what we do. Nice that your wife can pitch in.

Yeah she's been a beast. Here's what it looked like...was a year ago today actually:

 

[Stelcom66]

Oh %&*#, wow! Yea, you don't want to be splitting wood anytime soon. Hoping for a full recovery.

 

[Vg3200p]

I'm only 33 but have abused my body pretty hard. Multiple spinal cord injuries. All cartilage between my vertabrea was gone by age 16. I work a manual labor job and do all my wood by hand. I've found that a slow steady work pace I can work all day. If I try to go to fast I start hurting. For me it's all about pacing and working through the pain. Got alot of respect for you older guys that still bust some ass. Keep up the work

 

[Stelcom66]

And respect for you still at a manual labor job with that kind of injury. And good for you working with your hands - we need kids (I consider you a kid!) who are skilled in various trades, not just 'computers'. Great that you've found a way to manage by pacing yourself.

 

[Woodsplitter67]

Im a senior.. I have my share of issues.. The best advice I can say is keep yourself in shape. I stretch every morning, I work out monday through Friday. I do listen to my body and giv it a break when it asks for it. I also do preventative maintenance. I see a D.O. on a monthly basis to heep my back ect.. in alignment

I fined chipping away at it is so much better then long days. Last weekend I split in the morning and by noon was at the range..

Equipment helps.. Things and techniques that makes life easier look at the pic below.. my son is lifting a round thats a couple hundred pounds on to the splitter by himself

 

[Eman85]

What is a Hookaroon, Pickaroon? | Timber Therapy

The need to move timber from the forest to the factory before the use of heavy machinery in the late twentieth century led to the…

timbertherapy.com

Because we need to know

 

[trailrated]

My Fiskars Hookarron arrived today. Very light tool. Should make be a nice helper around the wood yard.

 

[lml999]

The only thing that I can add is acceptance of the fact that you may need assistance with some tasks sometimes. The friend, neighbor, family member who you have nearby is glad to assist because you have seen them through the same process. Even hiring a task done is necessary sometimes, such as buying wood split to blocks delivered.

Yep. Local guy helped me this weekend...he brought his chainsaw, I rented a splitter, we got through a couple of cords of wood and got them stacked. Cost me $150 for his time and $80 for the splitter. Money well spent. Still a bit sore Sunday evening, but we got it done.

Side note: He needed the money. I needed the help. Worked out well for both of us.

 

[CatfishHunter]

For years I played in a grand masters ultimate frisbee league. It's a young man's sport generally, but our team always started every practice and every game with a 15minute "happy back" routine. It was essentially stretching and yoga poses all aimed at making sure that us old guys didn't throw out our backs.

When I am cutting trees, bucking logs, splitting firewood, moving snowmobiles, or anything else that puts strain on my back, I take a few minutes of pause beforehand. I stretch, bend, twist, and do a couple of practice motions before getting into it. The first time that I grab my axe, I do a few slow swings with my light Fiskars axe before moving into using the splitting maul or anything else. An ounce of prevention can make a huge difference on your joints and muscles.

Also, as others stated, be smart with the heavy stuff. Use tools and physics to make things easier. Don't do anything hunched over.

 

[Garbanzo62]

My advice is to pace yourself. Work for an hour, take a break, then do another hour. Break things up in manageable chunks and let your body recover. So what you could do in one day when younger might take 3 or 4 days to complete now, but you won't end up in pain with the wife saying 'I told you not to over do it' for two days.

 

[FPX Dude]

Inversion table has been my savior for the past 30+ years, oh and good 'ol ice pack.

 

[patrickk222]

Personally both my shoulders rotator cuffs are ripped in half with a few others lig torn off the bone and extremely messed up spine and on the days im able to accomplish anything i tell myself if i dont get er done than i cant stay warm that and takin a few things seem to help a bit

 

[Garbanzo62]

A prophylactic does of Ibuprofen helps too.

 

[GrumpyDad]

Pain is weakness leaving the body, suck it up buttercup!

Or

Listen to your body and rest....

Which is it?
Well like everything in life, the truth is somewhere in the middle for me at least. Lethargy causes all sorts of problems when you go to use something, and do it hard. It's like skiing/snowboarding for me. I could be working hard on DIY stuff all summer/fall but the first day I go out, my legs are jelly within a few hours and I can almost not make it to the car.
Ive also had serious back pains whereas it would take me 15 minutes to get out of bed. I didnt really think that was a real thing until it happened to me. I went to the doctor and they gave me muscle relaxers, pain meds (WOOHOO) and steroids. It still REALLY sucked to get out of a car or bed after resting my body.
One weekend I promised my nephew I would take him skiing, and being a busy kid this was the weekend to take him or it would be quite awhile until the next time. I pushed through, and it took me very long to get my boots on and get to the slope. But then after riding a few runs my back felt normal, and I never had that pain again.

I also 'tore some stuff' in my knee. When Im under my cabin if I pivot in a certain way my knee is done for , the next couple of days. I have to walk carefully - especially in the morning.

The sharp pains, I dont ignore and I am careful and rest. The dull ones, I try to push through slowly.

Repetitive stress/injury is a real thing as well. Even for desk jockeys. Those dull aches, you need to pay attention to and determine if there is a different way to do the work that wont cause that, otherwise you may be dealing with years of nerve damage pain, which it is essentially.

 

[blades]

In 88, I was destroyed in a car accident- guy ran a sign. Whole left side wrecked top to bottom, they put me back together pretty well will always have some issues. I don't know that fancy name for it but the discs in my back are fragmenting lost 3" in height in the last 7 years. Tendenitis, carpal tunnel, rotator cuffs, you get the drift. about 8 years back helping friend with new roof and roof jacks let go, 1.5 stories down- son of gun can't fly, tuck and roll on the landing- don't bounce too well, couple fractured bones in right hand. Hernia a year ago, lifting squirming 50# pup out of tub, week after surgery slipped on ice getting out truck messed up right shoulder somemore and broke a rib same side. There are days that the left leg won't hold comes and goes pinched nerves. ah well life goes on still putting up wood just not as quickly. wiggle two or three rounds in to tractor bucket take to splitter set bucket level with beam( these are generally 18-25"dia noodle the monsters above that down to that range, Can't hook helps with that along with wiggling the log so I can get at them with the saws. did about 10 cords over the spring, summer, fall. Even though I have shrunk the floor/ground is still a lot futher away than it used to be. 71.75 years, kinda paying for misadventures of youth as it were. Still running my little machine shop as well, gave up running the snow plowing service about 5 years ago. Just got to be too much stress. I have some friends that tell me I am a slacker ( in fun of course, at least I hope so).

 

[GrumpyDad]

In 88, I was destroyed in a car accident- guy ran a sign. Whole left side wrecked top to bottom, they put me back together pretty well will always have some issues. I don't know that fancy name for it but the discs in my back are fragmenting lost 3" in height in the last 7 years. Tendenitis, carpal tunnel, rotator cuffs, you get the drift. about 8 years back helping friend with new roof and roof jacks let go, 1.5 stories down- son of gun can't fly, tuck and roll on the landing- don't bounce too well, couple fractured bones in right hand. Hernia a year ago, lifting squirming 50# pup out of tub, week after surgery slipped on ice getting out truck messed up right shoulder somemore and broke a rib same side. There are days that the left leg won't hold comes and goes pinched nerves. ah well life goes on still putting up wood just not as quickly. wiggle two or three rounds in to tractor bucket take to splitter set bucket level with beam( these are generally 18-25"dia noodle the monsters above that down to that range, Can't hook helps with that along with wiggling the log so I can get at them with the saws. did about 10 cords over the spring, summer, fall. Even though I have shrunk the floor/ground is still a lot futher away than it used to be. 71.75 years, kinda paying for misadventures of youth as it were. Still running my little machine shop as well, gave up running the snow plowing service about 5 years ago. Just got to be too much stress. I have some friends that tell me I am a slacker ( in fun of course, at least I hope so).

Jesus man!
Well it sure sounds like you stay active but at 80 I dont think I would have ventured up a roof. I have a friend that at 40 years old was hanging birthday signs up for his kids birthday outside, and he fell only like 7' and shattered his ankle, broke his risk and something in his shoulder. And he wasnt like a big guy or anything, and he played hockey all his life. It doesnt take much to mess yourself up bigtime with a roof fall.

 

[j7art2]

I've got a slew of health problems myself... pacemaker, TONS of old dirt bike injuries with plates and screws, and two slipped discs in my back from many many years of loading firewood rounds into the back of the truck the wrong way.

I take breaks when I need to, listen to my body and what it's telling me, drink plenty of water, and don't overdo it if I can avoid it. I stop when my body says stop. Sometimes that's 3 hours, sometimes it's 14. If I'm doing wood more than 2-3 days in a row, I visit the chiropractor, take pain medication if needed, and after I'm done with one stage, i REST. Rest is absolutely important. If I go to bed at 7:30pm and sleep for 10 hours, so be it.

This year was a rough one on me, I had elbow surgery (TENEX procedure) to fix my tennis elbow that's been plaguing me for years, which brought down months worth of pain at a 6/10 (especially when stacking wood) down to a 2/10 when working that lasts from a few hours to up to a day after if I'm doing wood more than one day at a time. I also slipped and dropped a 150lb round on my thumb and re-broke a previous broken thumb injury in the same spot which took a minute to heal. Luckily the break didn't prevent me completely from working.

I also will state that I likely wouldn't have nearly the back problems I do now if I had discovered a pickaroon myself 20 years ago. I just discovered them myself this year and it has been the biggest game changer I've ever had in how I handle firewood.

I bought a wooden handled one for $25 and broke it on the 6th swing, so I opted to build my own, both a one handed and two handed one, from solid steel using black iron pipe for the handle and a chunk of plow disk steel for the blade. My main pickaroon is about an 18-20" handle, and I also have a 30" one which I almost never use. I intend to make another 18" pickaroon so I can "dual weild" them and carry rounds in each hand when loading now. I find that even with the shorter handle, if I need to, I can easily two hand it and pull it up to me and carry. So much better on the back.

Part of me wants to try the Fiskars, but I'm finding that with my 30" one that I don't use, it's just too long and unweildy for me. I like the shorter one I made. It ain't pretty and looks like something out of a horror movie but it works way better than I could have imagined and I've heaved well over 100lb rounds into the back of my van without an issue when I've used both hands on it.

That being said, I also don't tackle anything over 100-150lbs or cut it to make it lighter. I find with dead/down oak, that means about 20" diameter at max. I used to be a young dumb kid loading rounds heavier than myself into the back of the truck, and I'm paying for it now.

One thing that helps for me too is that I almost always have bluetooth noise canceling earmuffs and music going when working and treat firewood as a workout routine if I can. I find that the more I enjoy the process, the better it is for me and the more I actually want to do it rather than dread it.

 

[Isaac Carlson]

I'm trying to build help before my son moves out. I am building a hoist wagon to move logs home with and it will also stack them. I get surge years where there is way more wood available than I can cut/process, so any way to get them home and stashed is a plus for me. I can put some big logs on the wagon, since it is rated for 10 tons.

 

[zmender]

Lot's and lot's of good mornings. Using light weights (empty barbell at gym works, holding some large wood rounds also works), and going for 50 at a time for 200~300, 2~3 times a week. Works wonders for erector spinae strength and endurance.

Learnt the trick after popping my lower back, rehabbed my lower back back in a couple of month after popping disc and have never felt any discomfort in my lower back since starting the routine, whether driving 10 hours straight, sitting at desk for 12 hours straight, or splitting wood with a 8lb maul for an afternoon straight.

 

[Cluttermagnet]

Emphatically yes to the pickaroon. I didn't think it could be all that helpful.
Boy is it ever! Using ramps, you can drag rounds up to working height
from ground level with a lot less bending. Highly recommended.

Clutter

 

[trailrated]

Emphatically yes to the pickaroon. I didn't think it could be all that helpful.
Boy is it ever! Using ramps, you can drag rounds up to working height
from ground level with a lot less bending. Highly recommended.

Clutter

I recently picked up a Fiskars one. It's not bad, super light, the hook could be slightly better IMO. But so far it helps.

 

[blades]

as the saying goes work smarter not harder, Anything that gives me mechanical advantage, safely is what I use. Even have a powered wheel barrow , need to add a third wheel in back so I do not have to pick it up off the rear skids.

 

[Max W]

For the folks here there’s ‘much take a lickin and keep on tickin‘ although maybe slowed down and modified. I can relate to “twice as long to do half as much.” It’s been a long long time since I cut and handled pulp and firewood all four foot, but a pulp hook is still pretty handy for moving rounds or splits. Swing the wood to where you want it and let go with a flick of the wrist, great for stacking. I buy 16 inch split now but if I were still using the splitter regularly I’d want to try a pickeroon.