Friday, January 21, 2011

Scariest moment in jiu jitsu?

Please share the scariest moment (or moments) in jiu jitsu for you. Not MMA-- we can do that in another post if you like. Just jits.

It can be a youtube clip, story, photo... it can be something happening to another person, or to yourself.  It can be scary because damage was done, because you snatched victory from the jaws of defeat, or even because you screwed up and snatched defeat from the jaws of victory.

Personal scariest moment is when my friend and training partner, Leila, broke her neck during training. She was rolling with a larger guy, and it was just a perfect storm of big person vs. little person, stacking, trying to roll over her shoulder to go inverted and beat the guard pass, etc. She broke her neck in every possible way without actually becoming paralyzed. She was in the hospital for months and we were all petrified. Fortunately she's such a badass that surgery and therapy succeeded and she even has continued to train.

My contributions should not be viewed by people with weak stomachs or children under age 18.



20 comments:

SL Chan said...

My scariest moment did not happen during jits but after jits and it is the most scariest medical experience I've ever had in my life!

I was triangled during a competition but the triangle to be honest wasn't really proper and was more of a neck crank then a triangle (the pressure against the top of my neck was immense but the sides of my neck were pretty loose). Anyway after that I had a nagging pain in my neck for about 2 weeks. I didn't really take care of it (no ice, no deep heat, nothing zilch). After a very light roll, I noticed that the pain in my neck was getting worse and stopped rolling for class. That night the pain just got progressively worse and in the morning I was literally paralyzed with immense pain from my neck. It was so painful that I had to be rushed to the ER and injected with anti-inflammatories because I couldn't swallow let alone drink due to the pain. The Doctor just diagnosed it as a muscle strain as the x-ray revealed the bones to be ok and gave me some anti-inflammatories then told me to have plenty of rest.

I thought it was over but it wasn't! Later that night, I sneezed really strongly and I threw my head back and the excruciating pain came back 10 times fold! I was rushed again to the hospital but because I had orally taken anti-inflammatories I was injected with a high dosage pain killer (which I found out 30 mins later I was allergic to and keep throwing up for 2 hours). So I spent the night in the hospital with a neck brace because any movement to my neck would cause immense pain (even after getting injected). It was a real ordeal because I felt like throwing up due to the allergy to the pain killers. They literally had to suspend me over the bed with a bucket at the side. I spent the next day in hospital till the afternoon.

I went to see the doctor again and he came to the same conclusion after MRI and stuff. Just a really bad muscle strain.

It was such a miserable experience! :( and one that was totally avoidable if I had taken care of the neck ache after the injury!!!! :(

JCC-CSV said...

I was rolling with a heavy weight belt last year and was trying to move him to a position where I could roll him over. Like I said, he was heavy and I had to post my arm, right about the time he became fatigued and decided to collapse on top of me, causing me to roll over my wrist and fingers (breaking 2 of them and fucking up my wrist).

Later that year I was rolling with a guy who tried a baseball bat choke on me, but was too inexperienced. Instead, he probed for a weak part in my trachea and pushed his forearm in with far too great a force. I actually, truly thought he crushed my trachea and that I was probably going to die.

HomeImprovementNinja said...

It's a two-way tie for me. Once, some big dude stacked me and rolled me over my neck before I had a chance to turn onto my shoulder and I was in serious pain. I have an uncle who broke his neck and had to wear that halo brace that screws into your skull, so I was freaked out when it happened. Luckilly it was just a muscle pull and a few sessions with a neuro muscular therapist fixed it.

The other one was the staph infection I got in my knee. I didn't know what it was at first and it got so painful that I couldn't walk. It didn't respond well to antibiotics and they ended up cutting my knee open to drain it. UGH!

SkinnyD said...

My coach makes every noobie watch the broken back video. Which I think is a great policy.

slideyfoot said...

I've not really had any, fortunately. The worst so far was pretty recent, when I thought I might have badly messed up my knee last Friday, due to the loud tearing sound.

But as I'm still walking, doesn't seem too bad, so I should be good to go for the open mat on Sunday (just light drilling for now though, no sparring).

AKA Mollie said...

For me, each and every snap or popping sound produced by a joint heard across the room is the scariest part of jits. Whether the sound came from me or someone else, that moment of uncertainty is terrifying.

AKA Mollie said...

For me, each and every snap or popping sound produced by a joint heard across the room is the scariest part of jits. Whether the sound came from me or someone else, that moment of uncertainty is terrifying.

Anonymous said...

My scariest was at that tournament I went to. Armbar that caused me to cry out, then cry, and I could not move my arm even an inch. It took 4 months to heal properly. I was so worried about it--I didn't have full range of motion for nearly 2 weeks.

Anonymous said...

My scariest was at that tournament I went to. Armbar that caused me to cry out, then cry, and I could not move my arm even an inch. It took 4 months to heal properly. I was so worried about it--I didn't have full range of motion for nearly 2 weeks.

Jiujitsunista said...

I've seen that broken back video before, but it still makes me sick to my stomach.

I've had two 'scary' moments. Once I was being stacked by a pretty large teenage kid. He had me stacked in such it was totally mashing my chin into my chest, and I couldn't form words or breathe very well, and I was having SERIOUS trouble moving him because of his largeness... I thought I was going to pass out or worse, have my neck broken. I ended up moving him, and was 100% fine, but I was really scared when it was happening.

And the other one was when I got slammed awkwardly onto my side, and then the person who slammed me lost their balance and came down shoulder first on the area he'd just smashed. It was easily the most painful thing that has ever happened to me... and I have had babies au naturale. Then when I got to the hospital, they thought I had internal damage. Which was even more scary. Though, all was fine in the end... It put me out of grappling for 3 weeks, and it was about 8 weeks before I could even attempt to roll normally. It was sensitive to pressure until I took my extended break, and the 9 month lack of grappling seemed to have fixed it. Yay for that at least.

SavageKitsune said...

Another vote for getting rolled over the neck. Especially when it's happening too fast for you to parse which way you need to move to avoid hurting yourself.

I have also had a handful of incidents (some involving the neck; some not- neck is always scariest) in which I was too wrapped up to tap, along with being too squished/smothered/breath-knocked-out to verbally tap. It's terrifying to not have that "stop" botton accessible.

Probably the worst of these occasions was when I was thrown by a big guy who then dropped on top of me and we rolled over several times all wrapped around each other. I heard/felt my neck make four separate popping sounds, and I could not tap. I had just enough time to think, "This is it. I'm going to die right now."

Thien said...

I dislocated my shoulder twice being stacked in the omoplata. But I wouldn't call it scary, as a weak shoulder is a reality I've been dealing with for the last year. It's more distressing, since you only realise after it happened.

-Thien

Rick said...

My first tourney. Made no gi finals. My opponent was a beast. Caught me with RNC. Sunk it in so fast and tight I couldn't tap. Literally. I could feel my heck and back wracked...popped... I lost motor control. The red stared into my eyes and asked if I was ok. Kept saying , "I can't tap! I can't tap!". He thought I was just trying to tough it out but I was so panicked 'cause I lost motor control. Didn't think to blurt out "tap". Finally the ref jumped in. My neck seized up and I could hardly move my head for a few days. Neck issues have kept me sidelined for the better part of 6 weeks now.

AbbyBJJ said...

I’ve had two very scary moments in BJJ. The first one was when this crazy white belt basically picked me up, turned me upside down, and spiked me on my head. I felt my entire neck crack. I was petrified and afraid he had broken it, but no harm was done.

The second scary moment was when I was working in a group of three people. We were switching out who was rolling on the mat between the three of us. I was sitting on the side line when all of a sudden this new guy (a wrestler) drove this other guy across the mat. They ended up falling on the guys who were rolling in my group. This was literally five feet from me. There was a loud snapping sound and the entire gym went silent. He ended up breaking my teammate’s tibia and fibula. It could easily have been me out there…

Jonna said...

I yelped and covered my eyes when I saw that broken back video months ago! I wouldn't wish it on anyone, even on my worst enemy. It's just so nasty and scary, you wouldn't imagine how to recover from that.

licarias said...

Mine is easy: When I had my upper ulnar collateral ligament torn by a white belt with something to prove. It put me out for 3 months, but I still have to protect my left arm when I roll but I am lucky that I didn't have to have surgery (yet).

Kage said...

Mine was during warm ups when we had one guy sprint while the other person would hold onto his belt to give resistance. As we were doing this my right toe caught between the mats. My body kept going pretty much splitting my toe in two. Bloody mess all over the place. Went to the emergency room and got stitches, don't remember how many. Wouldn't walk for 2 weeks either.

RN said...

Oh wow, reading these makes me kind of paranoid lol. I had my first really scary experience this week when I was going easy on a kid who seemed to want to prove something and cranked an americana. But my other hand was trapped so I had to yell out "tap" but I don't think he'd ever heard verbal tapouts before. I had to yell it six times quickly before he suddenly figured it out and let go. Everything's fine but for a moment, I was really worried he wasn't going to stop in time and I'm still feeling a little shaken up over the idea of both arms being trapped like that. It's a good reminder to be prepared for anything and to be more careful about who I roll with.

Unknown said...

the other night I was just practicing submissions with another white belt in my gym. he said he wanted to show me a choke called the "hell choke" (which is well named) had my collar wrapped around my neck so tight and he pulled so hard that by the time I tapped the damage had already been done, it felt like he broke my throat. for the rest of the night it felt like the right side of my throat was swollen and i could barely swallow. it's been bothering me for a few days now but seems to be getting better now. has this ever happened to anyone?

Georgette said...

Sounds painful, Nizar, hope you feel better!