The start of football season never seems to get here quick enough for die hard football fans. Now, consider the anticipation of a star player who’s been sidelined with an injury the entire last season. Nate Palmer will the first to tell you that September couldn’t get here quick enough! Palmer, now playing inside linebacker with the Green Bay Packers made his long-awaited return to the field and his team this fall after spending all of last season rehabbing an MCL injury.
Medial collateral ligament (MCL) injury is an injury to the ligament on the inner part of the knee. This ligament keeps your shin bone (tibia) in place. It can be a stretch, partial tear, or complete tear of the ligament. In Palmer’s case, his was a partial tear he suffered during the final preseason game of 2014-15.
“That was my first time not playing football since high school. I broke my ankle my junior year of high school and missed the season,” Palmer said in interview with The Journal Sentinel before his first game of the season.
Now, with the injury behind him the Chicago native (and former Simeon classmate with Derrick Rose) is back doing what he loves and from the early look of things he’s playing just as well as he feels these days. During training camp, Packers head coach Mike McCarthy described Palmer as, “just a natural football player”.
BlackDoctor.org recently caught up with Palmer to learn about his road to recovery and what he’s doing to stay uplifted in the game of Life.
BlackDoctor.org: What was the rehab process like for your? What did it involve?
NP: My rehab involved various healing techniques. I did physical rehab 4-5 days a week. During this portion I focused on strengthening the surrounding muscles to help support the knee. Each day I focused on a different muscle group. Example, Mondays I would do glutes and hips; Tuesday I would do hamstring and quads; Wednesday core and so on. Also, I did PRP injection, which is where they take the blood out your arm, spin it down and take the plasma and inject it back into the site of injury. I did things like acupuncture , chiropractic work and other Chinese medicine stuff, too.
Inside Man: Packers Nate Palmer’s Winning Remedy For Fear? “Trust Your Training” was originally published on blackdoctor.org
