About Ribs....? (Human ones, not the food!)

Factual Questions
1

This sort of my introduction as well as my question- So hello, I’m Adelaide, and now for my question: :smiley:

So now that you’re confused by my strange title for this post…I am a writer. And there is something I have to write about that I don’t really think I quite understand. I have seen in scrolling through that people ask just about anything under the sun so I assume this kind of question is welcome here…?

I am writing a book that involves horses and I did a lot of learning before I felt comfortable with that subject. I thought now that I knew about horses I could write onward but now, halfway through, I hit a brick wall. I found a subject I forgot that I didn’t know anything about. My main character is re-capturing a bull that belongs to the neighbors on the next ranch over and she ropes it she turn around and starts riding the other way. But she didn’t look back first- the bull ran the other way and when they hit each other’s end to the rope, it pulled the horse down and the bull around to face them. And the horse lands on top of my character.
In the end the bull gets away and the horses is fine but now I don’t know what to do with my character. Because she’s supposed to break two or three ribs. And I don’t know how to go about that. So I have a short (sarcasm intended):rolleyes: list full of questions I can’t seem to find answers to:
I know it would hurt when breathing, coughing, laughing, etc but wouldn’t it also hurt to walk? To get up off the ground? And to get up into into a tall, high off the ground truck? and to reach all the way around behind you on one side to reach your seat belt and then twist all the way the other way to buckle it? Wouldn’t you not be able to drive home? How would I describe the pain that she felt?
And recovery- I know they can’t put you in a cast but wouldn’t they ban you from riding horses till you healed? how long would it take to heal? Would she have to take something or do something special? Would she be in the hospital or at home? Wouldn’t it still hurt to walk ( a little at least) awhile after the injury occured?

Sorry for so many questions at once, I guess this one came out a doctor’s question… I’m one of those readers who hates it when the writer messes something up, therefore I’m one of those writers who want to make sure they won’t mess anything up in case a reader hates it. If that makes any sense.

Thanks to anyone who had the patience to read all that and also to anyone who answers,

~Adelaide<3

2

Speaking from personal experience—EVERYTHING hurts when you have broken ribs. Washing your face, combing your hair, putting on your socks. You really don’t realize how everything in the body is connected to your ribs until you break some.

I’d think your character would choose to avoid riding horses until she’d healed, which would be …maybe six weeks? Each time I’ve broken ribs, it hurt like the very devil to just get out of the bed for a week or so, and a few weeks more before I would have been comfortable climbing in the saddle.

No, she wouldn’t necessarily be in the hospital, just for broken ribs. (I broke 7 once, and collapsed a lung. I was in the hospital 8 days THAT time.) Pain pills, maybe, for a week or so.

3

Something like riding a horse would hurt like heck; the bouncing and need to use your core muscles to stabilize your torso would be quite painful. Going from a lying position to a sitting/standing position and the reverse is quite painful. Certain positions lying down are pain free and you figure those out pretty quickly. Climbing into a tall truck by reaching up with an arm and pulling yourself in could be quite difficult. The other movements would be OK, just slow and might involve wincing in pain.

While not recommended for long term treatment, wrapping an ace bandage around the broken ribs to compress the rib cage and keep things stable would help in the short term. The bouncing of the truck could be painful but unless the breaks are really bad it wouldn’t stop you from driving I don’t think.

4

FWIW I cracked/broke (not sure which, I didn’t go to the doc) rib(s) while riding my mountain bike. I fell and landed on some sharp rocks on hard ground.
Pain wasn’t too bad at first. Caught my breath got up. Got back on the bike and rode the last 4 miles out to the car. I was not setting any records on the trip home.
Yes it hurt somewhat with every breath.
Deep breaths really hurt. I rode a fair percentage of the ride 1 handed. (Look at John Wayne ride a horse my arm was up against my side like he used to hold his)
Getting bike on top of the car was painful.
Driving home was OK. When I got home I could not reach over my head without major pain, and my bike was on the roof of the car. That was bad.
Sleeping wasn’t bad but rolling over required me to wake up and think about it before attempting it.
Recovery was 4 or 5 weeks.
Oh yeah DON’T sneeze.
Hope this helps.

5

About 10 years ago I broke 4 ribs falling off a mule. (First time I had ever ridden.) During my recovery, I used to joke that “It only hurts when I laugh . . . or breathe.” But while it always ached some, it only really hurt when I twisted my body a certain way. It didn’t particularly hurt to walk.

The most painful thing for me was to get up from a reclining position, since the break was on the back part of the rib cage. I slept in a recliner chair for four months until I healed.

Immediately after breaking the ribs this would be painful but probably doable. Within a few days of my accident I was able to get into trucks etc as long as I held my body straight. I had no trouble driving an automatic. A manual might have been more of a problem.

The pain is excruciating. I had sharp stabbing pains if I twisted the wrong way.

Immediately after my accident, after I got my breath back, I got right back on the mule and rode another two hours to where we had parked our cars. It wasn’t fun, but the only other choice was walking, and that would have been worse. (However, at the time I didn’t know I had broken ribs. It just hurt like hell.) Then we had a 9 hour drive back to the city. (My friend drove, but I could have if it had been the only way to get back.)

One month later I rode a mule (a different one!) back to the same campsite where I had had the accident. Again, not much fun but doable. I had to sleep in a hammock rather than in a tent. I doubt my doctor would have approved, but I didn’t tell him.

It took me about four or five months until it didn’t hurt. I didn’t do anything special. I did all my normal activities, just very very carefully. I never was in the hospital - I just went to the emergency room the morning after I got home, where they took X-rays and told me my ribs were broken (and gave me some very delightful painkillers.)

Just how painful it is and what actions cause pain will depend on how many ribs you break, which ones they are, and on which part of the rib cage the break is. But while broken ribs are very painful, they are not necessarily incapacitating.

6

More anecdotal evidence.

Breathing was so painful I only made the shallowest of breaths. As a result I never at any time fully exhaled, got chest infection, turned into pneumonia. Ended up in IC.

7

I have broken several ribs on both sides on different occasions. The two incidents were 20 years apart, and both were the result of a motorcycle crash.
When you fall when straddling something like a motorcycle, bicycle or a horse usually the first thing that hits the ground is your shoulder, with your head hitting a split second later. Both times I hit the ground I broke the clavicle and the collarbone from the impact. The shock wave moves down and splinters the ribs and connecting cartilage and tissue. In both cases the splintered ribs punctured my lungs. This would be a very accurate injury from falling with a horse.
In my case my helmet saved a significant head injury, as my head hit hard both times. Being horseback she wouldn’t have the luxury of a full face Snell helmet, and you may mention a concussion as well.
In both crashes I never lost consciousness. I rode to town in a pickup the first time and an ambulance the second time. It is very, very painful, and the punctured ribs made me very light headed. But I never lost consciousness and I probably could of driven if there was absolutely no other choice, and if I was going to pass out and die if I didn’t.
When you have severe trauma to your shoulder and ribs that side of your body doesn’t function. Your character should have a difficult time opening the truck door and climbing inside. It’s doable but it would hurt like hell. She would also be fighting to not pass out. I knew my lungs were punctured by the way I was making wheezing and whistling sounds when I breathed. Breathing is very difficult.
If your character is very tough and level headed in an emergency she could get her self up and loaded into the truck. It would be an ordeal though.

8

Most rib fractures from blunt trauma are stable injuries. The rest of the chest wall splints the broken ones. Pain is usually sharp, exacerbated by deep breaths or twisting; well described above.

Occasionally, a fractured end will puncture a lung or one of the intercostal vessels that run undeneath each rib. This can lead to air between the lung and chest wall (which can occasionally be dangerous because it can prevent the lung from expanding properly) or blood between the lung and chest wall (occasionally also dangerous, depending on how much blood there is).

Multiple rib fractures can also be dangerous if they cause the chest to be unstable. You need a stable chest wall to make inspiration work properly.

It’s usually not necessary to “order” a patient with a busted rib to take it easy, because the intenisty of the pain prevents most people from doing anything. It’s not especially dangerous to do anything if the broken ends are in good position. If they aren’t then you probably have an unstable chest wall and doing anything is dangerous.

I usually tell patients they are going to have pain for at least 6-10 weeks, but of course this is extremely variable. I give them all narcotics for the first couple of weeks to use as needed.

A typical scenario would be a blunt chest trauma from a fall or whatever; a chest xray as a minimal workup to check for pneumothorax (air) or hemothorax (blood) and a presumptive diagnosis of one or more rib fractures based on where there is tenderness and pain. Sometimes we see the fractures, but often not. It is not necessary to actually see them. The clinical presentation is enough to make a presumptive diagnosis.

Isolated stable rib fractures without hemo/pneumothorax are not hospitalized.

9

I have never broken a rib, but I injured the cartilage that connects a few ribs to the spine. For 9 months it hurt every time I inhaled, and more so when I coughed or sneezed or lay down the wrong way. I assume an actual break would be much worse.

And by the way, oldfashionedgirl, welcome to the Dope. But if you are indeed a writer, you really need to learn to be more concise. Most of the OP was unnecessary background that took time to read. I guess you’re from the Victor Hugo school of writing.:wink: Anyway, welcome.

10

I know you didn’t ask about this, but this scenario is very implausible.

The first question I ask on reading this is “Why the heck is she *roping *a bull?” It’s a fully domesticated animal, not a scrubber, and it’s only gone through the fence, it hasn’t gone bush. Anybody with enough knowledge of horses and cattle to be *capable *of roping the animal wouldn’t even try. They would simply push the animal back through the fence. That is much simpler, safer, faster and less stressful to beast, horse and rider. So unless you have written some background about how this person came to be skilled enough to rope a bull from horseback, but so clueless about stockwork that she would do it for no reason, the whole scenario is going to raise eyebrows from anyone with any level of experience. Since you care enough to do research, I assume you want to avoid that.

The next problem is that, having roped an animal, she turns away. Once again, anybody with the ability to rope a beast isn’t going to make that mistake. You always, and I mean always, check how any animal responds to being roped. Even the tamest saddle horse in the world can go beserk if you throw a rope around its kneck. Any bull is very likely to do so unless it has been trained to a halter, which is unlikely unless it is a show animal. And if it has been trained to halter, why does it decide to run this time.

The next problem is that you describe her riding away with loose a loose lead, so the beast can run a distance and build up momentum before the rope goes taut. This isn’t something that *anybody *would do. Even if you have never worked with cattle before, you wouldn’t do this. The rope goes over the beast in a loose noose, and is then pulled taut to tighten the noose. The whole point of the rope is to lead the animal. So why, having a tight lead on the beast, does you character for some reason drop 5 metres of it on the ground? That makes no sense. And even if she did do that for some reason, why would anybody ride off with 5 metres of rope lying on the ground on the ground? That’s just not the way human psychology works. Even if, for some reason, you wanted 5 extra metres of lead, you would pay it out. You wouldn’t just drop it in a heap on the ground to get tangled up and ride off.

In the real world, she will be holding a taut rope once the noose is over the beast, and will have no reason to let it it become slack. So the bull can’t build up momentum.

The third problem is that a bull wouldn’t react to having a noose thrown over it by standing still for a minute, and then running. Either it will run immediately, and so won’t have a chance to build up momentum before the horse starts dragging it, or it will stand still until the rope rubs it the wrong way, and then it will start to buck like crazy. Cattle just don’t react by standing still and then galloping off. They need some *reason *to run, and if the initial sensation of being roped doesn’t do it, then any more stimulus from the rope will cause them to buck, not run.

Unfortunately, the whole scenario makes little sense from an animal psychology or stock handling perspective. You would be far better off having your character rope the beast (if you can concoct a reason why she *needs *to do so), and the beast react immediately by running. Watch some footage of calf roping to give some idea of what the reaction would be. A decent sized bull is more than capable of pulling a horse over without needing to build up momentum. This is especially true if the horse shys or, worse yet, rears, while the rope is over the pommel. Even the best trained stockhorses will do that occasionally, and if the horse isn’t used to roping, it is highly likely to do so. That scenario ends up exactly the same way, but your character doesn’t look like an incompetent noob in everything she does, and the animal isn’t behaving in really bizarre ways.

11

All I ever managed to do to my ribs was crack the cartilage in two of the floaters, and there was a constant ache every time I breathed in. Or out. Or held my breath. The first time I leaned into my desk (as I do all the fucking time), it hurt so much I couldn’t even say “ow” - I had to learn to sit back.

12

Thanks Blake, for the insight…but I feel I must explain that a little better. I didn’t before because I didn’t want to take up that much room in my post which was already getting ridiculously long, :slight_smile: .

I did research this, I also have read several book out of a series written by a cattle rancher. He once mentioned something that was along these lines so I looked it up, spent alot of time looking, before I came up with the scenario. Basically, she comes there with the owner of the ranch’s son (she’s a sort of friend/hired hand) with the intention of driving the bull, along with all the other cattle that got out with him, out of that pasture back to where they came from. She managed to do this with all of them but the bull. She spent alot of time on him and he wouldn’t. she tried drawing the rope down to a knot and popping in on the nose in an attempt to drive him back, (another thing I researched…) and it didn’t do any good- so finally she said to Sammy (the son) “It looks like I’m going to have to do somethin’ I didn’t want to do.” And attempts to rope the bull- using a houlihan loop (I am pretty sure that’s what it’s called?) Then, the reason she doesn’t look back- Sammy had just announced something along the lines of, “You did it! I knew we’d get 'im!” And she turned around to answer him, and allowed her attention to be removed to the bull. She had already tied the nylon rope to the saddle horn, and when she turned around she saw him running and it was too late to do anything, and he hit the end of the rope and pulled everybody down. Eventually the rope broke and bull didn’t leave however, he was more interested in working somebody over with those horns, so when the horse wallowed to her feet, she called to one of the ranch’s dogs, who had rode in the pickup bed, and he kept the bull off her long enough for her to manage to get up, walk to the passenger’s side of the pickup, climb in, and then Sammy had to drive it home in low gear (it was a manual).
Does that scenario make more sense or does it still need re working?
(Thanks to everybody else for your answers- You’ve helped me understand broken ribs alot more! I agree that a concussion would make sense- but how do I add in the Concussion?)

13

Nice thing about a concussion (from a literary standpoint) is it can have dramatic symptoms or none at all. So anything from, “Holy crap, your head’s split like a whore’s legs after church!” to “She felt a momentary ringing in her ears, shook her head to clear it and glared at her nemesis,” can be your indication of “concussion”.

14

Yes, I guess concussions can be “cool” for writing scenarios at least :slight_smile:
panache45, thank you for welcoming me! As a writer I am pretty busy so I probably won’t be on alot though… And yes, whenever I finish writing a chapter I re read it and delete everything that makes me wonder why the heck it’s in there anyway! :smiley:
I saw, by the way, that Colibri “Did all his normal activities” (or her,)… Since she works on a ranch, (my character I mean) and her “normal activities” involve loading big, heavy hay bales onto the back of a flat bed truck, (from the hay… oh, now I can’t remember the word I need; for now I’ll call it the hay lot but I don’t think that’s it. I hate it when that happens…), then putting the truck in low gear and letting it “drive itself” across the pasture and cutting the wire and spreading the hay out on the ground… and also include fixing fences, and oiling windmills, (the last two not daily of course!) I would assume that she wouldn’t be doing her usual activities… :wink:

15

My “normal activities” include sitting at a computer, driving back and forth to work, and hoisting a few cold ones on the weekend, so no.:slight_smile:

(However, as I said it didn’t prevent me from riding a mule or from hiking and camping. I don’t think I would have wanted to load bales of hay, though.)

16

Someone I knew who had broken ribs was advised to take several full breaths several times a day for just this reason.

17

Yes, taking deep breaths, I read earlier, is important- I am going to have to make sure my character is involved with people mentioning that “rule” so that it seems more realistic…

18

Is she going to have medical attention?

Some things that might make it read a little more true, if so: people with broken ribs usually have to wait for a rather long time at the ER, which is very frustrating. They feel just awful, but as long as they’re breathing okay, not coughing blood and can sit upright in the waiting room, we know they can wait. The more they can complain, the more we know they’re okay. The real emergencies can’t talk.

Then they finally get taken back and are told, more or less, “Yep, broken rib. Not much we can do for it. You’ll get better. Call us if you see any blood when you cough.”

A good nurse or doctor will tell them to do deep breathing, and may give them an incentive spirometer to help with that. Truthiness note: everyone does these wrong when they first pick them up. They’re meant to suck air out of, not blow into, and the breath should be slow and controlled not quick-and-get-it-over-with.

If she’s got time, the nurse will also teach her about “splinting” when she coughs, which just involves using a pillow, a rolled up blanket or a favorite teddy bear to clench to your ribs where it hurts the most when you cough. This helps to keep the broken ends of the rib lined up and reduces the pain of the cough.

All in all, very annoying. People want something to be done, and, much like broken toes, there really just isn’t anything to do for an uncomplicated rib fracture. If the pain seems really severe and you have a kind doctor, painkillers may be prescribed as mentioned upthread, but only for a week or two. Then patients tend to call in for more pain pills and are told no, which is another round of frustration.

So you could either have her drag herself into the ER and go through all that, or you can have another character who’s broken a rib in the past relate their experiences and save her the trip. Whatever works best for the story.

19

Oh yes, WhyNot… I can definitely see the lady of the house being worried and dragging my character to ER when it is a well known fact that she doesn’t like hospitals and doctors and white sterile places where they are known to stick you with sharp things like you’re a dart board. I can also see her thinking that the nurse is full of “hot air” while everybody else tries to convince the nurse that telling her all this won’t matter because she likely won’t pay attention to you… and I can see the sarcasm that could ensue. I think adding a trip to the hospital could both make it more real and make it pretty comical…

20

As an added detail, when I went to the ER and got X-rayed they made me lift my arms over my head for some exposures, which I had a lot of trouble doing because of the pain.

As for being stuck with sharp things, getting shot up with painkillers (which happened after the X-rays) was the best part of the visit.:smiley: