The Bread Basket

Some clarification has been asked for in regard to my recent affinity for bodily damage in the region of my crotch. First, the latest accident was NOT car related. I was clocked by another rider and hit the ground with a very efficient transfer of momentum through me to the ground. There was not a scratch on me or the bike. I hit the pavement and busted myself up like smashing a Cadburry Chocolate Orange into wedged pieces. Second, the 9/2006 Cadillac Attack was Pelvic focused and breaks were in the Pubis and Ischium. My current injuries are to the head of the Femur and the hip joint and the shattered elbow (more on that later).

Folks have been confused by the pelvis/hip location since Cadillac Jack and asking about my crotch always seems to come up with dinner guests and at parties. I'm a little embarrassed to explain the differences with personal knowledge of now breaking both. It's like knowing which bail bond guy to go to because of the options, one has experience with all of them.

The pelvis and hip relate kind of like how the collarbone and shoulder function to each other. More Starsky and Hutch than Laverne and Shirley I'd like to think. When I broke the pelvis I tore all the attached tendons and soft tissue. The process of rehab involved among other things, breaking up the developing scar tissue with a stick -called Graston massage; in the top inside edge of my leg just left of my junk. Recovery from rehab was in itself a form of rehab and included a lot of time sitting on ice packs. That lasted from January till June of which time I was able and interested in sitting on a bicycle 2x a week at best.

The current injury is all hip and no ice rockets to the crotch. The break is along the lines of what Floyd Landis went through when he initially broke his hip. There is more to Floyd than just the doping saga at the Tour, a whole timeline of his life that has little, if anything to do his testosterone level one day at the Tour de France. Anyhow, the head of the femur has been bolted, pinned, plated and screwed back to the femur and requires 3-months of no weight bearing what-so-ever for the bone to properly "grow" around the hardware. The issues at hand is to see if the blood vessel in the hip was damaged during the surgery. If so, it will likely show up in the next 2 years as the bone dies. Should this be the case, then we'll be looking at a hip replacement. So keep your prayers on that blood vessel!

The elbow is a different story. Most all the bones that make the elbow joint are fractured. Yet no cast! In my expansive experience of breaking bones, only now have I been recognized for having the maturity to not move what's broke. Casts' don't heal bones; time, rest, cacium and vitamin D heals bones. That means you Ice Cream! The arm is in a sling and the PT comes 2x a week to help me move what little range of motion I have into more and more flexibility to keep the bicep and tricep and rotator cuff from locking up as would be more likely with a cast. The irony is that the broken elbow is what put me in a wheelchair not the hip. Had I only hurt the hip, I'd be on crutches. So the sooner the elbow heals and is strong again, the more freedom I'll have to move around and such. By that point I might have the walker back out for use. Or even better, a baby stroller.