fall backwards while hiking
 

I was hiking a last week and walking down a steep hill when I lost my footing a bit and fell backwards. I initially caught the fall by stretching out my left hand behind me, after which I continued to slip and landed on my butt. So there were 2 impact moments, first my outstretched hand behind me and second my butt. I remember clearly that landing on my butt was not a very hard impact as I had already caught the fall and more just slid onto my butt. But I cannot remember clearly if the initial sideways fall that i caught with my arm was very hard and if this jolted my head and neck.

Since this fall, I have had quite a bad headache at the back of my head and my neck hurts when I turn it to the left.

Could this have caused re-injury?

whiplash

This event strongly suggests a whiplash injury. It can cause symptoms that are similar or overlap concussion symptoms.

which part of the impact do you think is whiplash, the first contact when I landed on my hand or the second when I slid onto my butt?

Do you think this is enough force to cause a whiplash if I was able to catch myself with my arm? Or could the force have extended to my neck?

Since the hill was downward sloping I did not need to fall as far back before reaching the ground compared to if I fell on a level surface for example. Does this make a difference?

Your first thread has much of the same info and suggestions that ahould work for you now.
Banged shoulder against sliding door.. could this cause a concussion

Reading thru other threads can be helpful too .

"Since this fall, I have had quite a bad headache at the back of my head and my neck hurts when I turn it to the left. "

Your symptoms scream whiplash, not head injury/concussion.

Don't try to analyze the forces involved...

Thank you very much for the replies. I am still wondering if this fall could have jolted my head and neck as I find it quite strange when I think about it because I cannot for the life of me remember specifically what it felt like when my hand made contact with the ground as I first fell, and I’ve tried to imagine the different possibilities and the different ways that I could’ve possibly fallen and caught the weight. I only see that see it being quite a big jobs because

I’m quite sensitive to things like my head shaking so I think if the fall had been forceful I would have noticed this and been alarmed by it but the fact that I didn’t feel this makes me think that it’s possible I somehow had a more controlled fall and somehow fell more gradually. But when I try to reenact how I could have fallen and caught the weight, the possibility is that there is quite some force involved in the downward fall because it’s quite a distance to the ground, especially going backwards, and I don’t know how I could have fallen in a way that wouldn’t have involve catching a lot of weight in force with my hand.

I guess my question is, would it be possible to have such a fall not jolt your head and neck? is my memory of not feeling a jolt possible or am I just miss remembering it due to the shock / speed of the incident?

For context, I was not walking through fast or and I was not running or anything like that.

You treat the symptoms, not the event.

As I said, Don't try to analyze the event. It is a waste of effort and anxiety. Even the best experts know they cannot connect the mechanism of trauma to a specific injury.

I realize that every fall is different but am just wondering if in theory it is possible that such a fall does not cause harm. Especially if you do not remember feeling a jerking movement.

I keep trying to tell myself not to worry about this incident but whenever I imagine falling in that way I do not see how it would be possible to catch my fall without a lot of force being placed on my neck and shoulders.

Is the movement and impact I felt during the fall something to go off of or not?

Yes, it is very possible such a fall did not cause any harm at all.

Stop analyzing these events. They only cause anxiety. You create a false response by thinking these things.