any quick tips for the first 24 hours beyond RICE? I also just read that I should wait that long to take any NSAIDS so that my body's* natural processes can do their thing with the inflammation.

Your body's gonna do what it's gonna do anyway; why not help it out? And, it's easier to stop pain from starting than to end it once it takes hold! 600 mgs ibuprofen twice a day, with 500 mgs tylenol if you need it. This is less than a prescription dose of either, and you can take the two together. I take this concoction fairly often for my back.

As -t says, part of the damage from a sprain comes from inflammation, so my approach is to take NSAIDs from the start and even double up on them. Tylenol is not anti-inflammatory, and you don't want to take Tylenol and percoset, because that doubles your Tylenol. For a sprain, I think it's ice and elevation until the swelling goes down significantly. Did they put on any kind of splint or bandage?

I feel like you need something that's some other color, Typo. Spinach, maybe?

You can take 800 mg of ibuprofen every 6-8 hours. I don't recommend doing it for weeks and months, but in the first few days after an injury? Do it. Drugs help your body out, yo.

Ooh, yeah, add a handful at the last minute so it's stays nice and bright green, just a splash of color and flavor. Or grated carrots, that would be pretty.

Or stick with the sophisticated white-on-white dish, that's kinda now, I hear.

You can take 800 mg of ibuprofen every 6-8 hours. I don't recommend doing it for weeks and months, but in the first few days after an injury? Do it. Drugs help your body out, yo.

That juxtaposed with this:

Ooh, yeah, add a handful at the last minute so it's stays nice and bright green, just a splash of color and flavor. Or grated carrots, that would be pretty.

Has me crying with laughter.

Heh. Ibuprofen likes carrots?

I was doing a little whiplash reading those.

But, yeah, in the Army it was standard for the docs to prescribe 800mg 3x a day with meals for things like tendonitis.

I found the empty box of motrin that I bought a couple weeks ago, but can't find the motrin, grrr. Gonna dig under the bed to pull out the old barely used bottle of some barbiturate I was prescribed for inflammatory tendonitis in my neck for the night. Oh, but I know so well about being so far into pain that I've lost the window for painkillers to be effective (hi, cramps!).

Adjusted the crutches so they don't bother me (had to read up on proper usage of them and discovered the nurse had adjusted them wrong. Apparently I shouldn't rest my weight on my armpits! Never knew that).

Okay, I'll shut up about my freaking booboo after this, but I just have to share the weird phenomenon that, while watching TV or reading, I keep expecting the characters to be hobbled, more so with the book I'm reading. I keep being surprised that they are able to do what they're doing, you know, like, "shouldn't they ask for help for that? the writer's cheating, there's no way they could do that task for so long without needing to sit down! How can Harry be throwing kicks on a bum leg?" and then have to actually remind myself that the character isn't injured. It's really strange.

Tom Hiddleston. I think I just melted.

He is just too much. ridic crush on that one.