Healing Update III, RELOAD THE WALLET

Going back to work today. I'm nervous. It's been a while. I have not earned a dime in May, the last time I worked was April 30. Now I'm able to handle at least part of a day without narcotic pain killers.



Yesterday was the first day for that. I got up feeling better than ever since the injury. So I took Vicki back up Bear Creek and we hiked most of the jeep road up to the trailhead, and walked down the trail for a little ways. It was Vicki's first exposure to the Rainbow. I hope this section of trail will be come very familiar to her.

I did way too much. I got home exhausted and in pain. Took some pain meds and promptly fell asleep for two hours. But I feel like at this point I need to do a little too much every day, as long as I can rest my way back to feeling OK by the next morning it isn't too much.

This whole damn thing has been really intense. It's been humbling, frightening, depressing, boring... and inspiring. My friends and family have completely overwhelmed me with their support and work on my behalf. I have been touched deeply. Thinking about it chokes me up.

Now I'm trying to claw my way back to normal life. But it's going to be different. This has changed me. My old habits and routines have been completely blown up. Lots of what I do on a daily basis will change. My perspective has been changed.

Wish me luck. I hope I can be worth a crap at work. I need more than my income back, I need my life back.

Healing Update Too

Today Saturday May 24th I woke up feeling decent. Not done with this by a long way, but better.

Forecast was for a stormy afternoon and evening, so I decided to make the most of a pretty morning when I'm feeling good. I drove Vicki up to Bear Creek and we went for a walk up the jeep road. I 4-wheeled up part way then left the truck with the goal of climbing up to the trailhead and back. After about ten minutes I adjusted my goal to, make it a mile then turn around.

After a while my friend Chris S rode up and stopped to talk (he incidentally is a radiology guy who has taken x-rays of me after previous run-ins with two-wheeled vehicles). Then Alex B came up and I got to tell both of them my war stories. I felt that I should have a large gnarled wooden cane to lean on as I told the whippersnappers my tales of bravery and misery.



Where you see the whippersnappers up the road is about as far as Vicki and I went.

Which was fine. It was so nice to just be out in the fresh air and the aspen leaves had popped. I love the brand-new aspen leaves. They are so fresh and light-green. Hummingbirds trilled through the woods. It was nice.



I think Vicki liked it too.

This whole thing has been pretty mind-altering for her I bet. She gets adopted and spends 5 or 6 weeks with me, gets past trust into having fun. Then I go away for a long weekend. She gets to stay with a wonderful lady and an incredibly hunky 8-year-old blue heeler, so it's not traumatic that I'm gone, but still. Then I come home for 12 hours, we sleep together in my house. In the morning I drive her to the hospital parking lot and ask her to wait. After several hours somebody else (someone she trusts deeply) comes along and drives her home. Then it's back to the nice lady and the hunky heeler.

I'm gone for another 3 day spell. And when I get home I'm...

different.

I move differently, I seem to sleep a lot. I'm home all the time, which she clearly likes, but I'm not chasing her around in the yard playing like before. We only seem to go to places that are a couple blocks away, and I walk like somebody who just busted out of the nursing home but forgot to grab the walker on the way out.

It's going to be a while yet before I can give her a workout when we go to the woods together. But it's nice to take a baby step.

I took a 90-minute nap when I got home. I think I'll sleep well tonight. Amazing to think that walking eight tenths of a mile with maybe 175 vertical feet of climbing could be a workout. But that's where I'm starting. Bring on the healing, bring it on.

Healing Update

Doctor's appointment today with Dr Johnson who was in charge of me when I was in the hospital. Dr White is my personal doctor. I saw Dr White last Wednesday and will see him again Wednesday afternoon. This was my so-long, farewell appointment with Dr Johnson. She ordered an x-ray which she'll check out, but I'll be taking it to my family doc Wednesday and will follow through with any problems with him.

I can walk, and have been taking Vicki with me at least once a day down to Riverside Park. If I go more than about a mile it wears me. And it's a pretty much senior citizen pace. But I can move around.



Tough for the Vicki Dog though. Thanks again to my amazing friends for getting her out there sniffing and playing. Here's a picture of her on a walk with my friend Sydney.

I slept probably 3 hours or more during the day today. I'm still managing pain, and often find myself on the recliner in front of a movie realizing that it's almost over and I have been sleeping.

Hmm. Lots like being a senior citizen.

Reporting on Status Reporting

Hello!

To people still reading this blog, all six of you, just wanted to let you know about things around here.

My first real experience riding dirtbikes went wrong on me. At first it wasn't wrong, it was a blast.



My friend Earl and I hauled the bikes over into Utah to the San Rafael Swell. We rode about 120 miles on Saturday May 3. Perfect weather, lots of chances to learn and figure out my motorcycle. Good fun day.

I was really tired on Sunday but we both wanted to ride at least for a while before loading up to go home.

My crash was unspectacular, embarrassing really. It wasn't that a challenging obstacle got the best of me, it was a total spazz move. For my mountain biking friends, it was your basic SPD fall. Not because you're going big, but a less-than-graceful reaction to a challenge situation.

I am far from having poise on a dirtbike. I was doing a decent job of faking it for much of the weekend, but when things went a little wrong on Sunday my response wasn't the kind of instinctive, muscle memory instant reaction I expect when I'm on a mountain bike.



I spazzed.



Upshot is that I broke some ribs. It was six, left side numbers 3-8 right near where they attach to the spine.

For the sake mainly of friends and family, I'll try to make some updates in this blog in the coming weeks. Current status:

• Managing pain with pretty serious medicine.
• Not working (job). Obviously wasn't working last week from the hospital. Haven't been able to operate without pain killers and that's going to be what holds me back from going back. I will have to be able to tolerate hours in an office chair with a clear head. I think that's not going to be this coming Monday. Please stand by.
• Fantastic people coming out of the woodwork to help me with things.
• Fantastic dog keeping me company, and being very patient about how slowly I move.

Thanks everybody, and check back here for news.