In stitches
Saturday was one of those days that leaves a lasting impression. The doctor said probably about 7 to 10 days.
See, it all started off so innocently. I got up early for my 8 AM paddling practice and had a kick ass time. The wind was really high so we had to fight against huge waves, and you have no idea how much fun outrigger is when the waves are big. Awesome!
Then I got home and I really wanted to keep doing stuff outside, so I immediately went online to find bike routes on the North Shore. I'd always wanted to bike out to Horseshoe Bay, so I set that as a long range target... it looked pretty far, though, so I decided that Lighthouse Park would be good enough and that I'd only go further if I were feeling particularly strong.
I packed my back pack with a big bottle of water, a protein bar, and a big bag of chocolate covered almonds (mmmm, club pack of goodness). Just before I left, my friend J called me up and asked if I wanted to go rollerblading. I kinda wanted to because I haven't gone blading in several months and I'd like to get to know J better -- I just started hanging out with him a couple weeks ago with wall climbing and he seems like a really nice guy -- but I already had my heart set on this long distance bike ride. I thanked him for the invite and told him I'd definitely want to join him some other time, but that I couldn't make it today. Little did I know, it probably would have been better for my health to have gone with him.
But anyway, I hopped on my bike and set off. Down to Cardero, up to West Georgia, and then all the way through Stanley Park. You can still see a bunch of downed trees in there from the storms in early winter -- it's kinda sad, really -- but you're still surrounded by some really big trees as you bike your way up the gradual incline.
Then I reached the Lion's Gate Bridge, which takes you across the mouth of Coal Harbour to the North Shore. I started across, doing even more uphill. By this time, my legs were really starting to whine, but I was loving the exertion. I reached the halfway point on the bridge and started heading downhill, gaining speed as I went. I cranked up to my highest gear and peddled hard, taking advantage of the slope.
The view was absolutely stunning! It was a beautifully clear, sunny day and the local mountains looming before me were gorgeous. And looking out into English Bay? Wow! It's days like these that I'm struck by how incredibly fortunate I am to be living in one of the most beautiful cities in the world! I was filled to the brim with pride and happiness for being in a place like this, and so full of joy for having the privilege to be able to do so many wonderful things right in my own backyard. That's when I suddenly realized I should have brought my camera. Damn it, I never think of bringing it with me, and this would have been the perfect opportunity. Of course, hindsight is always 20/20, and I'm glad now that I didn't.
You see, about 30 seconds after that thought, I was reaching the second of the two major junctions on the bridge. On the car portion of the bridge, the road is completely flat, but on the section for pedestrians and bikes, there's a raised section. At the first junction, I'd been heading uphill and didn't have much speed behind me, so it was no problem. I was going pretty much as fast as I possibly could at this point, though, being at my highest gear and still hardly being able to keep up with peddling. Yeah, I was going fast. Now, on my way to work, there's a section with a steep downhill and some large speed bumps. I used to go over them carefully, but I eventually found that I could take them at full speed. I figured that the small ramp on the bridge would be the same, and that I could take it just the same.
I couldn't.
I approached the ramp going pretty much as fast as I could and my front wheel hit it. My wheels left the ground, ever so slightly. Crap. My centre of balance started shifting forward, over my handle bars. Oh shit. My bike touched down again and I tried to gain control, but I couldn't quite get it. I swerved sideways and my mind calmly told me "This is gonna hurt". My body left the bike seat and all that was between me and the rapidly moving concrete was thin air. And then my body slammed and slid and scraped its way into and across the rough, solid surface. And then my bike crashed on top of me.
I regained my composure and got to my feet. Nothing broken, just a few scrapes. Well, more than just a few. My right side looked pretty badly scratched up and there was a decent amount of blood, but there was nothing all that serious. Honestly, I was in much better shape than I'd expected after such a bad fall. My cycling jacket was torn up pretty bad at the right elbow and I could feel that I had some bodily damage there, so I peeled the jacket back a bit to take a peek. Yep, lots of blood, but from what I could see from a cursory inspection, it was just a bad scrape like on my knee. Nothing serious. I realized now why those extreme bikers wear so much protection, and I thanked my lucky stars that I was at least wearing a helmet. And I was now very glad that I hadn't brought my camera, as I probably wouldn't have had much left of it by now.
My bike lock was about 15 feet away from the crash site, and so were the remnants of my tail light, but that was all that was missing from my bike. My front fender was bent out of shape and was dragging against the wheel -- and the end of one of its spokes had been snapped off -- but I was able to twist things back into shape enough that the wheel had no unwanted friction unless I applied the front brakes. The bike felt a little worse for wear, but a simple tune up should probably get things back in shape.
I briefly thought about heading back home, but I'd only been out biking for 10 or 15 minutes and I'd had such grand plans. It all would have felt useless if I just turned back now, and I wasn't hurt all that badly -- the injuries felt more annoying than painful, and I wasn't losing enough blood to cause any concern -- so I decided to keep going.
So on I went. I kept going for quite a ways, but eventually I decided I'd had enough. Rather than going all the way to Lighthouse Park, I stopped at 26th Avenue in West Vancouver. I stopped for a moment to take in the scenery and then headed back home. My minor injuries were started to annoy me a little and I was feeling a little less strong than I'd like to for such a long trip. Besides, I had a sneaking suspicion that I'd feel fine as long as I kept moving, but that if I reached my goal and took a long break, it would be much harder and more painful to get going again. So I headed back.
All the way back through West Vancouver I went, back up the long incline of the Lion's Gate, then back down the other side (slowing down for the bump on the downhill side), and then back through Stanley Park and all the way home. I put my bike away, went up to my apartment, and started examining the damage.
First I took a closer look at my knee. Nasty scrape, still bleeding a bit, nothing I couldn't handle. I peeled back my shorts. My underwear was all ripped up at the hip and I had some nasty road rash there -- complete with little bits of black underwear ingrained throughout. Yay. There was also a big of a scrape down at my ankle, but nothing of consequence. The heel of my left palm, while sore and a little swollen, had no external damage, and my right wrist looked fine but felt a little sore when twisted. I slowly started to take my jacket off, peeling the torn up right sleeve off slowly because the copious blood inside had started drying and was sticking to my arm and elbow. I peeled it off bit by bit, revealing more and more or the scrapes and scratches and...
Oh my god, that's deep! Gack! I'm missing a whole chunk from my elbow. How did I not notice that the first time I looked? I went to a mirror and took a peek. Eww, that looks really nasty. I paced around a little bit, trying to figure out what to do. Did I need stitches? I'd never had any before. I decided pretty quickly that I should at least go to the hospital to inquire. So I put all my bloody cycling clothes back on and headed out. I made a quick stop at the book store on the way so that I'd have something to occupy me during my inevitable wait, and then headed over to the hospital.
I got to see the triage nurse right away and said, "I think I might need stitches." He asked to see the wound and then told me, "Oh yeah, 2 or 3 at least. Probably more." So he put some kind of dressing on it, I went to check in, and then I went to the waiting room. I waited there for a short while and then was called in to see another nurse. She asked me a few more questions and then took me over to a bed and told me the doctor would be with me soon. While I wasn't attended to instantly, I was actually really impressed with how quickly I was treated. Nice!
So the doctor arrived, he put me at ease, and he did his work. He irrigated the wound, froze it, and put all the stitches in. It was all utterly painless and the doctor was really nice, but I always get woozy and squicked out when there are needles involved. I had to put the bed all the way horizontal so that the tugging feeling of the stitches wouldn't put me over the edge, and I did my best (unsuccessfully) to relax my tensed muscles and to stop twitching my feet, butt cheeks and fingers. When I'm feeling squeamish, my whole body joins in. But he was done in probably 15 minutes or so and he left me to relax a bit. Then a nurse came along and dressed it for me, giving me some extra pads, wrapping cloth, and tape for the rest of the week. And I was free to go.
You know, the weird thing about this whole ordeal is that I'm actually kinda excited about it all. I've never had stitches before, and now I've finally joined the stitched crowd. It's like a right of passage or something. I can't say I'm looking forward to joining the broken bone crowd anytime soon, but this is one I'm almost proud of. I've been telling people about it more as a "Hey, look what I did! *giggle giggle*" than whining, but I must admit, I'm usually a bit of a suck when I get hurt. The good thing, though, is that none of the injuries really hurt much. They feel annoying, and I try to be very careful with them (trying to avoid bending my right arm is a real pain in the ass), but I only had severe pain when I woke up in the middle of the first night. Other than that, nothing really. So no big deal.
The only part that really bugs me is that my active lifestyle is being put on hold for the next 7 to 10 days. I have to keep my elbow dry and clean, and I can't put much stress on it. That means that my 3-days-a-week paddling (which starts in the not-so-clean False Creek) is definitely out, and my weekly wall climbing and several-times-weekly gym workouts are also on hold. Argh! I usually do one or even two strenuous physical activities every day, and now I have to go a week and a half with nothing. What am I gonna do? I'll probably try to do a bit of cardio, and maybe even a leg workout or two (or not) to keep myself active. I'll have to get my bike tuned up so that I can take it to work sometimes, and hopefully the copious sweat won't be too bad for my stitched elbow. And I'll probably go on one or two hikes next weekend so that I can do something active that is both interesting and social. But I'm really gonna miss those old standbys. I'll look at it as a chance for my body to relax a bit so that it can make some really good gains when I start back up again. See? There's a bright side to everything.
So yeah, I'm now a stitches boy and I'm proud of it. I feel like one of the big boys now. I'm all grown up. :)
See, it all started off so innocently. I got up early for my 8 AM paddling practice and had a kick ass time. The wind was really high so we had to fight against huge waves, and you have no idea how much fun outrigger is when the waves are big. Awesome!
Then I got home and I really wanted to keep doing stuff outside, so I immediately went online to find bike routes on the North Shore. I'd always wanted to bike out to Horseshoe Bay, so I set that as a long range target... it looked pretty far, though, so I decided that Lighthouse Park would be good enough and that I'd only go further if I were feeling particularly strong.
I packed my back pack with a big bottle of water, a protein bar, and a big bag of chocolate covered almonds (mmmm, club pack of goodness). Just before I left, my friend J called me up and asked if I wanted to go rollerblading. I kinda wanted to because I haven't gone blading in several months and I'd like to get to know J better -- I just started hanging out with him a couple weeks ago with wall climbing and he seems like a really nice guy -- but I already had my heart set on this long distance bike ride. I thanked him for the invite and told him I'd definitely want to join him some other time, but that I couldn't make it today. Little did I know, it probably would have been better for my health to have gone with him.
But anyway, I hopped on my bike and set off. Down to Cardero, up to West Georgia, and then all the way through Stanley Park. You can still see a bunch of downed trees in there from the storms in early winter -- it's kinda sad, really -- but you're still surrounded by some really big trees as you bike your way up the gradual incline.
Then I reached the Lion's Gate Bridge, which takes you across the mouth of Coal Harbour to the North Shore. I started across, doing even more uphill. By this time, my legs were really starting to whine, but I was loving the exertion. I reached the halfway point on the bridge and started heading downhill, gaining speed as I went. I cranked up to my highest gear and peddled hard, taking advantage of the slope.
The view was absolutely stunning! It was a beautifully clear, sunny day and the local mountains looming before me were gorgeous. And looking out into English Bay? Wow! It's days like these that I'm struck by how incredibly fortunate I am to be living in one of the most beautiful cities in the world! I was filled to the brim with pride and happiness for being in a place like this, and so full of joy for having the privilege to be able to do so many wonderful things right in my own backyard. That's when I suddenly realized I should have brought my camera. Damn it, I never think of bringing it with me, and this would have been the perfect opportunity. Of course, hindsight is always 20/20, and I'm glad now that I didn't.
You see, about 30 seconds after that thought, I was reaching the second of the two major junctions on the bridge. On the car portion of the bridge, the road is completely flat, but on the section for pedestrians and bikes, there's a raised section. At the first junction, I'd been heading uphill and didn't have much speed behind me, so it was no problem. I was going pretty much as fast as I possibly could at this point, though, being at my highest gear and still hardly being able to keep up with peddling. Yeah, I was going fast. Now, on my way to work, there's a section with a steep downhill and some large speed bumps. I used to go over them carefully, but I eventually found that I could take them at full speed. I figured that the small ramp on the bridge would be the same, and that I could take it just the same.
I couldn't.
I approached the ramp going pretty much as fast as I could and my front wheel hit it. My wheels left the ground, ever so slightly. Crap. My centre of balance started shifting forward, over my handle bars. Oh shit. My bike touched down again and I tried to gain control, but I couldn't quite get it. I swerved sideways and my mind calmly told me "This is gonna hurt". My body left the bike seat and all that was between me and the rapidly moving concrete was thin air. And then my body slammed and slid and scraped its way into and across the rough, solid surface. And then my bike crashed on top of me.
I regained my composure and got to my feet. Nothing broken, just a few scrapes. Well, more than just a few. My right side looked pretty badly scratched up and there was a decent amount of blood, but there was nothing all that serious. Honestly, I was in much better shape than I'd expected after such a bad fall. My cycling jacket was torn up pretty bad at the right elbow and I could feel that I had some bodily damage there, so I peeled the jacket back a bit to take a peek. Yep, lots of blood, but from what I could see from a cursory inspection, it was just a bad scrape like on my knee. Nothing serious. I realized now why those extreme bikers wear so much protection, and I thanked my lucky stars that I was at least wearing a helmet. And I was now very glad that I hadn't brought my camera, as I probably wouldn't have had much left of it by now.
My bike lock was about 15 feet away from the crash site, and so were the remnants of my tail light, but that was all that was missing from my bike. My front fender was bent out of shape and was dragging against the wheel -- and the end of one of its spokes had been snapped off -- but I was able to twist things back into shape enough that the wheel had no unwanted friction unless I applied the front brakes. The bike felt a little worse for wear, but a simple tune up should probably get things back in shape.
I briefly thought about heading back home, but I'd only been out biking for 10 or 15 minutes and I'd had such grand plans. It all would have felt useless if I just turned back now, and I wasn't hurt all that badly -- the injuries felt more annoying than painful, and I wasn't losing enough blood to cause any concern -- so I decided to keep going.
So on I went. I kept going for quite a ways, but eventually I decided I'd had enough. Rather than going all the way to Lighthouse Park, I stopped at 26th Avenue in West Vancouver. I stopped for a moment to take in the scenery and then headed back home. My minor injuries were started to annoy me a little and I was feeling a little less strong than I'd like to for such a long trip. Besides, I had a sneaking suspicion that I'd feel fine as long as I kept moving, but that if I reached my goal and took a long break, it would be much harder and more painful to get going again. So I headed back.
All the way back through West Vancouver I went, back up the long incline of the Lion's Gate, then back down the other side (slowing down for the bump on the downhill side), and then back through Stanley Park and all the way home. I put my bike away, went up to my apartment, and started examining the damage.
First I took a closer look at my knee. Nasty scrape, still bleeding a bit, nothing I couldn't handle. I peeled back my shorts. My underwear was all ripped up at the hip and I had some nasty road rash there -- complete with little bits of black underwear ingrained throughout. Yay. There was also a big of a scrape down at my ankle, but nothing of consequence. The heel of my left palm, while sore and a little swollen, had no external damage, and my right wrist looked fine but felt a little sore when twisted. I slowly started to take my jacket off, peeling the torn up right sleeve off slowly because the copious blood inside had started drying and was sticking to my arm and elbow. I peeled it off bit by bit, revealing more and more or the scrapes and scratches and...
Oh my god, that's deep! Gack! I'm missing a whole chunk from my elbow. How did I not notice that the first time I looked? I went to a mirror and took a peek. Eww, that looks really nasty. I paced around a little bit, trying to figure out what to do. Did I need stitches? I'd never had any before. I decided pretty quickly that I should at least go to the hospital to inquire. So I put all my bloody cycling clothes back on and headed out. I made a quick stop at the book store on the way so that I'd have something to occupy me during my inevitable wait, and then headed over to the hospital.
I got to see the triage nurse right away and said, "I think I might need stitches." He asked to see the wound and then told me, "Oh yeah, 2 or 3 at least. Probably more." So he put some kind of dressing on it, I went to check in, and then I went to the waiting room. I waited there for a short while and then was called in to see another nurse. She asked me a few more questions and then took me over to a bed and told me the doctor would be with me soon. While I wasn't attended to instantly, I was actually really impressed with how quickly I was treated. Nice!
So the doctor arrived, he put me at ease, and he did his work. He irrigated the wound, froze it, and put all the stitches in. It was all utterly painless and the doctor was really nice, but I always get woozy and squicked out when there are needles involved. I had to put the bed all the way horizontal so that the tugging feeling of the stitches wouldn't put me over the edge, and I did my best (unsuccessfully) to relax my tensed muscles and to stop twitching my feet, butt cheeks and fingers. When I'm feeling squeamish, my whole body joins in. But he was done in probably 15 minutes or so and he left me to relax a bit. Then a nurse came along and dressed it for me, giving me some extra pads, wrapping cloth, and tape for the rest of the week. And I was free to go.
You know, the weird thing about this whole ordeal is that I'm actually kinda excited about it all. I've never had stitches before, and now I've finally joined the stitched crowd. It's like a right of passage or something. I can't say I'm looking forward to joining the broken bone crowd anytime soon, but this is one I'm almost proud of. I've been telling people about it more as a "Hey, look what I did! *giggle giggle*" than whining, but I must admit, I'm usually a bit of a suck when I get hurt. The good thing, though, is that none of the injuries really hurt much. They feel annoying, and I try to be very careful with them (trying to avoid bending my right arm is a real pain in the ass), but I only had severe pain when I woke up in the middle of the first night. Other than that, nothing really. So no big deal.
The only part that really bugs me is that my active lifestyle is being put on hold for the next 7 to 10 days. I have to keep my elbow dry and clean, and I can't put much stress on it. That means that my 3-days-a-week paddling (which starts in the not-so-clean False Creek) is definitely out, and my weekly wall climbing and several-times-weekly gym workouts are also on hold. Argh! I usually do one or even two strenuous physical activities every day, and now I have to go a week and a half with nothing. What am I gonna do? I'll probably try to do a bit of cardio, and maybe even a leg workout or two (or not) to keep myself active. I'll have to get my bike tuned up so that I can take it to work sometimes, and hopefully the copious sweat won't be too bad for my stitched elbow. And I'll probably go on one or two hikes next weekend so that I can do something active that is both interesting and social. But I'm really gonna miss those old standbys. I'll look at it as a chance for my body to relax a bit so that it can make some really good gains when I start back up again. See? There's a bright side to everything.
So yeah, I'm now a stitches boy and I'm proud of it. I feel like one of the big boys now. I'm all grown up. :)