Building Callouses

[A. E. Lowan]

We've got a character who was healed by magic of a critical wound, and in the process his callouses from sword work and blacksmithing were lost. Does anyone have a rough idea how long it would take to build them back up? Weeks? Months?

Thanks!

 

[Svrtnsse]

Found a page for guitar players who says it takes about three weeks: How to Build Guitar Calluses: Take Care of Your Fingers!

As quoted from the page:

So realistically you should expect at least three weeks before you have any decent calluses developing. By a month you'll be in good shape if you exposed your fingers to consistent practice. Otherwise it can take longer. But if you do everything right (mentioned above) and avoid all of the bad (mentioned below), you might have fully developed calluses in three weeks time, but be good enough to not notice any real pain within two weeks.​

 

[A. E. Lowan]

Found a page for guitar players who says it takes about three weeks: How to Build Guitar Calluses: Take Care of Your Fingers!

As quoted from the page:

So realistically you should expect at least three weeks before you have any decent calluses developing. By a month you'll be in good shape if you exposed your fingers to consistent practice. Otherwise it can take longer. But if you do everything right (mentioned above) and avoid all of the bad (mentioned below), you might have fully developed calluses in three weeks time, but be good enough to not notice any real pain within two weeks.​

Perfect! Thanks so much!

 

[CupofJoe]

A long time ago, I spent a summer working in a metal working workshop [lots of manual filing and hammering and the like], and in eight weeks I definitely had callouses. When I started it took me only a week or so to get the blisters. Once they were dealt with the callouses formed. So if your MC is starting from soft skin, then I think there will be rawness and blisters first.

 

[A. E. Lowan]

Yeah, he's definitely starting again with soft skin.

 

[skip.knox]

Two or three weeks sounds about right, drawing from my own memory. It was different for steel strings than for nylon, and of course it depended on how long you played each day. Also, a guitar player is using just a small bit of the tip of fingers, so the callous-building is localized and more intense. For gripping swords and hammers, I'd go with the longer stretch experienced by CupOfJoe. Depending on the level of detail in your narrative, you could probably just say "a few weeks" and be solid.

 

[A. E. Lowan]

That will work great! I realized that it's been a few months (October to January) since this character lost his callouses and I've still been describing him as being in the blistering phase. Talking out my butt without knowing what I was talking about, turns out. Thank you guys so much!