I ignored the pain as long as I could. It hurt, but wasn't as bad as having a tooth pulled. By October it really started to hurt. It would throb all night after a day of fishing and I switched to a new, less painful casting style that involved keeping your elbow locked in position close to your side and casting with your wrist. I lost distance and accuracy, but it was slightly less painful. It was a miserable way to fish, but it was still fishing. The new casting style was no help when you have a fish on however. Every time I set the hook it felt like someone was simultaneously stabbing me in the elbow with an ice pick. Fighting a fish was almost as painful and lasted a lot longer.

You are probably thinking, "why didn't this moron rest his arm for a while". I know this would have been the wise course of action. The problem is that the Blue Winged Olives (BWO) hatch in October and November, and this is my favorite hatch of the year. If the BWO hatch this year had been like the one last year, I could have saved myself a lot of grief, but the hatch was fantastic this year. I couldn't help myself, it's a sickness. It was fish, fish, fish, then go home and throb, throb, throb.

By the second week in November I couldn't pick up a coffee cup without wincing. Simple things like buttoning my shirt caused pain. That was enough. The BWO hatch was almost over anyway and I decided to give it a rest. I thought that a week or two off and I would be good as new. Its now late December and I'm still waiting to the arm to heal.

You don't get much sympathy when you hurt your arm flyfishing. It seems impossible to hurt yourself casting a 2 ounce fly rod. It sounds like an injury only wimps and sissies get. Today someone said, "Oh, poor guy fishes so much that that he hurt his arm". Like they wish they had that problem.

One more thing, if I had it to do over again, I wouldn't change a thing.