I sprained my ankle

You should be fine by the summer if you are smart about this injury and let it heal. Rest, ice, elevate and compression. If it hurts, don't run. Get on the elliptical and bike in the meantime. Think about using an active ankle brace while you're rehabing it, and get some PT if it's a bad sprain. You don't want it to turn into a chronic issue

Do what he said... Rest, Ice, Compression, Elevation. Also get the ankle brace but don't become reliant on it.

Do you know if it was a sprain (ligaments) or strain (tendons)? It is most often a strain which heals more quickly. A sprain will often put you on crutches.

For starters, again what he said... get a ankle brace. I have one that fits on the heal and then has 2 straps that go over your ankle. Much more comfortable and you can adjust the tension. Another neat thing you can get is a ankle shaped ice pack that has a strap that wraps over too. Keep training too. If there is pain swimming, biking, and running... use a stationary bike (preferably one that has the handles that move back and forth) and pedal with one leg. The increased blood flow will help the healing process too.

Bad news for the future is:
You will be more susceptible to rolling your ankle over.
It hurts the worst the first time.

Good news is:
Your ankle will have more flexibility and you will be able to recover more quickly from further ankles sprains/strains.

Also, pick up some L-Lysine... it is a amino acid that will help your muscles rebuild. It will aid in your recovery and you can continue to take them to aid in your recovery from everyday training.

Edited by chile7473 2007-02-11 4:31 PM

I have WAY too much experience in this area. Trained hard in fall '05...then 2/1/06 sprained ankle BADLY. Did not get back even running until MAY '06 and that was VERY EZ jogging and not for long at all. One year later I would consider myself close to 100 %...very lucky.

Hopefully yur situation bettr than mine........my age (43) and LONG history of ankle sprains didn't help. Hope you iced it in the first 24 hrs..that's important. X-ray'd ??

For many months after I started back running I iced 20 mins then heat for 20 mins. Bought one of those heat wraps you pot in microwave. Also, search online for exercises you can do to strengthen ankle.....very helpful for me.

There is one exercise in particular that wil help you gauge how weak/strong yur ankle is and it will help strengthen. ONLY WHEN you can stand comfortably should you try this. Simply stand on one leg and balance, starting out with both arms extended to help balance. You should eventually be able to do this for 3 mins, then try it with your arms in, then try it with your eyes closed, with the final goal being eyes closed, arms in for 3 mins. How close you are to that now is a crude indicator of ankle strenght. Be careful.

Also, get Adventure Bear to read this...very knowledgeable.

Good luck.

I sprained my ankle 5 years ago and it still is larger than my other ankle and sometimes hurts a little bit. About a year ago it locked up on me when I was running. Luckily I was a block away from the ER. The doc there told me I will always have trouble with that ankle and sever arthritis. Hello disability.

Hmm, this sounds familiar. I also sprained my ankle playing basketball during the second week of January. Although I've rolled my ankles many times before, this was perhaps the worst, or at least the most painful. In fact, I spent a week on crutches, which I found helped speed my recovery considerably compared to my past incidents.

I've been back running on it now for about two weeks. The first time back I basically had to powerwalk, but I found the next day my ankle felt considerably better and I could run on it with a slight limp. The next day was even better.

From what I've read on online med sites, the sooner that you get back to running on it, the faster you'll recover. Of course, it has to be within your pain tolerance. I would say in my case I had "discomfort", rather than true pain. It's a judgement call.

I also agree with the other posters that said you won't be 100% for over a year. In fact, I would say my last rolled ankle took more than 20 months to fully recover-- that's why you can't just sit around waiting to be "fully healed". It's just not going to be for quite a while.