Chloe

I'm all settled in Vancouver with my hubby, my family and my recovery companion, Chloe!

All fixed up

Typing with both hands and my pudgy, swollen fingers is a bit of a challenge, but here goes.

As you can see by the photos below, the surgery was done yesterday. Not only did it go well, but we were reassured that this was in fact the right decision. When Dr. Nelson opened me up he found that "pseudoarthrosis" had occurred in my fracture site. In other words, my body had turned the gap between the bones into a "joint." It was obviously a joint without tendons and ligaments, but was filled with fluid so that the bones would glide nicely. I guess this explains why I had minimal pain but still a lot of fracture motion. Anyway, when pseudoarthrosis occurs, the fracture will never heal itself with new bone.

I also was able to escape the bone graft from my hip. This was a huge relief as I have heard that this would be more painful than the clavicle and would ache for quite some time. Dr. Nelson was able to create enough of a graft from the fracture fragments and the cleaned up bone ends to fill in the gaps.

I found this whole process fascinating. I loved the fact that I got to watch them set up the operating room when I got settled on the table. I had about 6 hours in the waiting room to get over my nerves, so at this point so I actually enjoyed seeing the tools placed out, watching the OR nurses rushing about to prep the room, watching Dr. Nelson pull my x-rays on to the tv monitors. I don't remember much beyond hearing the anesthesiologist say, "I'm going to give you some medicine now," and I am probably thankful for that!

Thank you to everyone for your kind, healing wishes! And, thank you to my hubby, Adam for being by my side yesterday. From what I could tell, spectating surgery was just as exhausting as spectating an ironman. I think he crashed before I did last night! And, thank you to my wonderful mother-in-law, Wendy for going above and beyond with pre and post-surgery hospitality!

Today was day 1 of the road to recovery and I can't say I felt like doing much more than a walk around the neighbourhood, followed by multiple naps, but I'm ok with that. I have to admit that my shoulder does feel foreign to me. It aches, but that's no big surprise. What's most bizarre is this sense of artificial sturdiness and rigid support. I don't think I could have poor posture and slump even if I wanted to! But, I suppose this is to be expected for having a plate of metal in there.

Celebrating with Tiff. Wine for her, prune juice for me.

*I apologize if this is a grammatical mess. I feel as rotten as I look in the photo above!

Success!

So long my friend!

Photo a day

Because I love taking photos, love blogging, and love my new iphone, I have decided to chronicle my journey from surgery to health this summer with a photo a day.

One last ride: a soggy morning at Jericho Beach.

Surgery

Ugh, I didn't want to have to write that word on here. But, at 4.5 months after the crash, my collarbone has yet to heal. A CT scan last weekend confirmed this and it also revealed that there is much less healing that we had thought based on the x-rays. This really isn't what I expected as I knew it wasn't fully healed when I went down to Arizona, but my range of motion was perfect and I was basically pain-free (apart from overhead activities...). Coach Darren and I decided to give my shoulder a big rest from anything aggravating. So, for the past six weeks I have not gone anywhere near a pool that isn't kidney-shaped, wearing nothing that resembles a 'real' swimsuit. No cap, goggles or paddles in my hands, just a plethora of trashy romance novels. That relaxing environment, in addition to the vitamin D overload, was what we were hoping would help the healing progress. That's all we were looking for, some progression. But, it looks as though my body has given up trying to heal this fracture. What I do find amazing though, is that I am almost symptom free, yet my collarbone still has a 1cm gap between the bones with a whole heck of a lot of 'floating' movement. However, if you ask me to lift some dishes out of the cupboard, put my bike up on the wall bike rack, or take a swim stroke, well, that isn't exactly symptom free. But it is amazing that my body has adapted the best it can to having the clavicle in two distinct pieces.

Surgery at this point wasn't really a question. The decision to move forward was unanimous between my very cautious, yet fantastic doctor, Dr. Keeler, surgeon Charles Nelson, and well, me. I'd like to swim again one day, please!

Surgery will happen on Tuesday (yes, in just 5 days). I am excited and nervous. Definitely more nervous though. The operation might involve a bone graft. When Charles (and Dr. Keeler who is assisting the surgery!) get in 'there' and clean out the fracture ends, they will make the call. If the two ends of bone don't fit together snuggly, they will take some bone from my iliac crest (hip). This bone will be added to the fracture site to fill in the gaps and promote healing. The plate and screws will then be drilled in and I will be stitched up. Sounds simple, right? I'm sure it is straightforward to an orthopedic surgeon, but whenever I picture the process I get really queezy. Charles even went so far yesterday as to describe the type of drill he will be using. My hands went right over my ears, earmuff style, singing la-la-la-la-la to drown out his voice. Sorry, but there are some things I just don't want to know.

Right now I am packing up for the next three months. Adam is working in Vancouver for the summer so rather than recover alone in Victoria, I will join him and my family. My goal is to make it to Europe to spend the month of August in Switzerland with my new training group. I realize this is only 8 weeks after surgery so I won't exactly be doing a heck of a lot of training, but it would be a motivating environment and I would be able to spectate three of the WCS races.

But for the immediate future, it's all about preparing for Tuesday. I need to get my hair cut as I know from past experiences that I will not be putting it in a pony tail myself and I'm not sure I want to test the strength of our marriage by asking Adam to assist with this again :) I've also pulled out my sling which I had hoped to never see again, my 80's style bandeau bras, and any top I have that can be pulled on from the ground up or zips open. I feel like I am preparing for another bike crash! UGH!

I'm off for another rainy bike ride, but I will not complain about this as this might be my last chance for awhile :(

Cover Girl

I normally like to blend in behind the scenes but when you're on the cover of a magazine called IMPACT, it's not so easy.
I'm not complaining though, being a cover girl is kinda neat!