I am 25 yrs. old and was diagnosed with this same injury a year ago after running my second half-marathon. Please listen to your doctor's orders precisely b/c this sort of stress fracture is more severe than most. Not to scare you, but I had a pretty bad experience. I was on crutches for six weeks post-diagnosis with absolutely no activity. I didn't listen and rode the bike a few times and also walked short distances around my house without the crutches. At the six week mark the stress fracture was a complete hairline fracture and I went in for surgery two days later. They placed 3 pins in my hip to stablize the bones. Anyway, recovery was hard and I was on crutches for 5 months total. However, I am doing really well now. My surgery was almost a year ago and I have been training for another half-marathon! I am running in the Austin half next weekend. This is the very same weekend last year I found out I had to have surgery so I am going to go celebrate the fact that I can walk, better yet run this year! Please be very careful and feel free to email me if you need to talk to someone.

quote:<HR>Originally posted by cancer86:
Hi, i am a 20 year old runner, just diagnosed with femoral neck stfx. Thought it was adductor tear for 3 months, just had an mri and bone scan and learned about the stress fracture. MRI said slight fracture, bone marrow edema swelling....I cannot run or play tennis at all. Biking and sleeping are the only nonpainful things. Any suggestions? How long do these take to heal? Do calcium supplements help?<HR>

I would be looking at why a healthy 20 y.o. would be getting a stress fracture. In other words, you are probably not getting the right nutrition to be healthy. TE (Total Effort) that posts on this site sustained a serious toe fracture from dropping a microwave on it. The ER saw him and sent him right away to an ortho. Two days later the doc took x-rays (comminuted fx I believe) and told him to come back in a week.

One week later he retakes the x-rays...and stares at them...and stares again...and says "all healed". Total fx of toe healed within 9 days.

TE will tell you that he double-dosed on all of his supplements...try this:

Cod Liver Oil - 2 tsps per day
Zinc - 100 mg per day
Cal/Mag - 1/1 ratio maybe 500/500
L-Glutamine - get the powdered and take at least 3 heaping tsps per day

Eat only whole unprocessed foods and get a lot of sleep.

Good luck!