OUCH!

I’m not sure but I think I may have a knitting related injury. Several weeks ago, my left thumb was aching for apparently no reason. The day before, I had worked for several hours on my Charlotte’s Web shawl. Darling Fiancé joked that I may have “knitters thumb” (very original huh?), I did think, “Maybe I had overdone it with the knitting”. I noticed that the thumb and index finger on my right hand kept falling asleep as I was knitting, so maybe I was stressing the left thumb as well.

I picked up Charlotte yesterday morning to get in a few rows before leaving for work. I hadn’t touched her since before going to Vegas. Again, as I was knitting the right thumb and index finger kept falling asleep (that feeling of pins and numbness is horrible). Then by yesterday afternoon, the left thumb was aching, I couldn’t grab a glass without having a horrible pain. Last night I rubbed “tiger balm” down the thumb before bed; it is much better today, just a slight ache.

It’s very peculiar, the numbness and pain does not occur when I knit anything else. I’ve been working on other projects the last few weeks with no side effects. I knit for 2 hours on the plane Friday and was fine. Yet, ½ hour on Charlotte, and I miserable.

Here is my best guess on why this is happening. I am TERRIFIED of dropping stitches on Charlotte. I have never done lace before and honestly do not know if I could properly pick up a dropped stitch in a lace pattern. This has never ever been a concern before, I know what knit and purl stitches look like, I’ve picked up stitches before without batting an eye, heck I’ve even purposely dropped stitches down as far down as 10 rows to fix a mistake. As a result of my fear of dropping stitches on charlotte as I get further and further into it, increasing stitches, I think I am clutching the needles harder then normal. This is the only explanation. I may go home tonight and check my gauge again, I’d bet I’m tightening up. Oh well….
Other then that life is going pretty well.