with a sawsall.. I was doing a spa installation and the spa did not show up as the truck had broke down, I did not want to come back the next day, I had to start another contract and this was just a small job, I told the guy around 3 in the afternoon if the spa showed up call me. Well 2 hours later I was driving 40 miles to his house to do a hours worth of work, I was kinda miffed and did a stupid thing: and next thing I knew the last joint of my right thumb was hanging from about a third of the skin there.
I was rushed to the hospital where they spent 3 1/2 hours reaching up into my hand, cutting open places here and there to retrieve the tendons and ligaments and sew them all back together so I would have some ability to use the thumb again.
Went to about a weeks physical therapy and all and was told I would never have over 20 percent use of the thumb. I decided to screw them and started my own exercise plan. I can now bend it like I always could, I just have no feeling in about a third of the thumb. Being such it hurts to hold anything in it for long because I cannot judge how hard I am pressing with it and I cramp up my palm muscles real bad. So, Having played guitar since I was a grommet, I went and tried, but found it too difficult, A friend bought me a left handed Strat and made me try every day for about 2 months till I developed a way to pick the string using my ear to decide where my thumb was in relation to the E and A string and my index and middle fingers for the rest. I use my ring finger to rest on the guitar and it gives me a gauge as to how where my thumb is. The next big hurdle was to transfer all that muscle memory from left handed to right. I still struggle with that at times, I will hear a song I used to play and it is just to easy, till I realize I have to learn it again, and pound the song into memory just right handed. Sounds are backward to me a lot and Sometimes I can be at a loss for the simplest things. But after years of 2 hours a day 5 times a week, I am back being able to play most things I ever have,].
I do not shred anymore, nope without the ability to feel with my thumb that does not happen, but then I can play leads, just do not expect me to do thrills and super fast runs, I am a lot more melodic in my approach now. Also I have found that My chord vocabulary has grown by leaps and bounds as I finger pick through inversions instead of using a lot of barre chords, I can reflect more dynamics that way, heavy pounding on chords to me is an issue as the dynamics is not there not being able to feel the pressure and using my ear to decide how hard I am strumming.
It has been a path to rewalk, But I think I would have shot myself if I could not play. It was my while life, I was not willing to leave it.
I may never be a rock star, but one day after I retire, drop a dollar in my guitar case as I play you a song sitting on my stool down at the beach having a blast pounding out songs of my life.
