for the edification of others

[swan_tower]

The other day at the dojo, our sensei had us punching bare-handed against bags (the flat pad type that another person holds onto). I wound up punching mine a few more times with a little more force than was strictly wise — because of course I did; I’m a writer and I was curious to see what it felt like, and I’m unlikely to go around getting into fist-fights just for research.

Since my hand is still complaining at me a little bit today, I figure I should share what I learned with others, so they don’t have to do the same thing. 🙂

The actual impact stung a fair bit, and increasingly so as time went on, of course. But I was good about keeping my wrist straight, so the impact went up my forearm in a direct line; you can really mess yourself up if your wrist isn’t straight, because then it will buckle under the impact and you’ll probably sprain something. (And I really do mean straight. Mostly straight = not good enough.) My knuckles turned visibly red, and I got a small mark in the webbing between my ring and pinky finger, like I’d chafed the skin or something. Fortunately I didn’t persist to the point of really doing myself a mischief, because near the end I subconsciously flinched from the sting of impact; my wrist buckled, but there wasn’t enough force in the punch for that to do any damage, and then after that everything I threw was complete crap. I imagine that adrenaline would have carried me much further in a real fight, but odds are good that it would also have made me more likely to use bad form and hurt myself that way.

My knuckles stayed faintly red for the rest of the night, but were back to normal the next day, and the mark faded about as quickly. The lingering effect is in the soft tissue between my metacarpals: I still feel an intermittent ache there, and if I use my left hand to shift those bones around, I can tell there’s tension and stiffness. So the moral of this story, I think, is that if you’re going to talk about punches leaving a mark on the one who threw them (and you should, unless your character is a hardened bare-handed brawler), the problem isn’t so much in the knuckles as in the hand itself. Or the wrist, if they threw a stupid punch and sprained something. Or, y’know, all over the place if they were really dumb and dislocated a finger or broke a bone. But the palm of the hand is going to take a beating even if nothing more severe happens elsewhere.

So now you know. And don’t have to pound your own hands to find out.

Originally published at Swan Tower. You can comment here or there.

Comments

[yhlee.livejournal.com]

Out of writer-curiosity, I once decided to punch something instead of someone. I chose a pine tree. I highly disrecommend this as a course of action. One, that damn tree sure wasn't going to budge because of me. Two, the sap gets into the cuts in your knuckles and it stings.

I can only say that I was an extraordinarily stubborn and stupid teenager. :]

[swan-tower.livejournal.com]

You're lucky you weren't so enthusiastic about the punch that you hurt yourself with more than just the sap. O_O

[yhlee.livejournal.com]

Yeah, no kidding--especially considering that, at the time, I knew exactly zero about how to throw a punch. I'm lucky I didn't break my hand.

I also tried burning myself once with a kitchen match to see if I could get to a third-degree burn, also out of curiosity, but my pain tolerance sucks and I chickened out after I got to the blister.

There are some things for which I really recommend secondhand research instead of the DIY approach.

[swan-tower.livejournal.com]

Dear god. The only other person I know of who's tried to burn themselves that badly was a fictional character trying to convince himself to stop using witchcraft.

[aulus-poliutos.livejournal.com]

Tree sap is also a good bandaid replacement. Tinder fungus works even better in case the bleeding is stronger, once you beat it soft with a wee rock. Fix it with some strands of long grass or willow bark. You can do the same with coltsfoot leaves which also work as desinfectant.

Yeah, I'm pretty good at surviving trips in the wilderness when I've forgotten to pack the first aid kit. :)

[brooksmoses]

From the peanut gallery, I'm just going to note that this is a fascinating and delightfully evocative little piece of characterization!

I don't think I could punch a pine tree hard -- to punch something hard I would have to believe in the follow-through of my hand continuing to go forward past the point of impact, and I've dealt with enough pine trees to know that was lies past the point of impact is unpleasantly rough bark and obnoxiously-irremovable sticky sap and an awful lot of solidity. The pine tree trunk in my imagination is one that I'm not particularly inclined to even casually touch.

[alessandriana.livejournal.com]

If you have long nails, they will also cut into the palm of your hand, and could probably make you bleed. (I never remembered to trim my nails down often enough on the various occasions I tried martial arts...)

[swan-tower.livejournal.com]

Oh yeah. I have my nails trimmed, or I would have had trouble.