Thank You all

[ladyicon]

Welcome to the board. You are safe here.

[crazycanuck]

Coz I can..Glad to hear you're healing. Take your time & remember you're a good person

Do you need any home baked cookies or yummy stuff?

[surgtech1956]

Glad you're on the mend. Glad you found TE, there's great people here, great information, advice, ................. Get those fingers typing.

[arielmoon]

Hi and welcome. Isnt this place awesome? I too am recovering from an accident. I am just now back on the trainer and I *hope* to be out on the road again soon. I send some healing vibes your way!

[coz i can]

Wow thanks for the welcome notes! You guys are cool

crazycanuck - thanks for the cookie, yummy stuff offer, I have so over indulged over the last couple of months, rather than tapping into my sensible I have tapped into my fridge and pantry! Crap, talk about making it all that much harder for when I get back on my bike, there is a little bit more of me to tackle that challenge - bugger!

jesvetmed - oops, sorry forgot to add Australia to my location, will update, thanks for that

What happened? well briefly, I was in a ride that was seeded, unfortunately people can seed themselves in whatever grade they think they are, rather than earning the right to be there. One guy who should not have been in A grade was struggling with the pace and perhaps also having a non male person in the group got to him and he got messy and knocked me quite hard, I never saw him coming, at the time of the crash we were doing 48kms an hour (29.8mi) and I hit the road face first. I dont remember anything of the crash and was unconcious for about 15 minutes, so my account of it is as told to me by those that were there, of which about 15 of them landed on top and around me. My injuries were all very fixable, and I am very very lucky that I didnt end up worse off. One of the guys behind me couldnt stop his bike and ended up skidding on my back so I scored a lovely tyre mark and loss of skin on my back. Heaps of riders landed on top of me and I ended up being nearly corked all over. My face lost some pretty impressive chunks of skin and flesh but my doctor is so impressed by what she calls my miracle skin as my face is healing beautifully and you can hardly tell that at one stage I was looking pretty scary. My concussion and corking lasted nearly 3 weeks so the first couple of weeks follwoing the crash are very hazy. I damaged my right knee pretty badly and took a lot of it off, taking it down to nearly bone and exposing all the nerve endings, that took weeks of debriding and medical care every second day (debriding is where they manually remove dead flesh and it hurts). I broke my collar bone in 4 places, my right one, and I am so so right handed! When I had my 6 week xray, as the surgeon said in the beginning that it would heal by itself, my xray showed no healing, in fact at 6 weeks the bones were further apart rather than closer, this was due to the soft tissue damage that ocurred on impact of kissing the road - the soft tissue around my clavicle was badly disrupted and got in the way of the bones coming together. So last Monday I had surgery to plate and pin my bones together. And it will now, apparently, take 6 weeks to heal.

As a nice little bonus, my husband and I are moving house and the removalists are coming on Tuesday. Arrgghh! The light at the end of my tunnel is that we fly to Europe on the 24th June for a 6 week holiday (it was going to include a participation mountain ride of the Tour de Fance, but I wont be doing that now).

So many words, I really suck at briefly! I go back to the surgeon on Friday for a post op chat and in about 3 months I will have a second op to remove the plate. As soon as he wound pain and drugs wear off I can start on the wind trainer. Am so looking forward to that!

[sundial]

Coz, bless your heart! What a nasty, nasty spill. I'm glad you weren't hurt worse even though it was a pretty bad fall. Let your body tell you when you are ready for the trainer and for the outdoors. There is an ebb and flow to healing. Some days you take two steps forward, other days it's two steps back. Don't get discouraged-- just take your time and allow your body to heal. In the meantime we'll try to keep you entertained.

[tctrek]

You go girl! You are amazing that you can go through that and want to get back on the bike and start again.

What does it mean to be "corked"?

[MM_QFC!]

Coz, bless your heart! What a nasty, nasty spill. I'm glad you weren't hurt worse even though it was a pretty bad fall. Let your body tell you when you are ready for the trainer and for the outdoors. There is an ebb and flow to healing. Some days you take two steps forward, other days it's two steps back. Don't get discouraged-- just take your time and allow your body to heal. In the meantime we'll try to keep you entertained.

++1 on the 2 steps forward and then a bit in reverse too...don't get discouraged!

I am another recovering "corked and concussed rider" (from being hit by a car) so, I am all too familiar with the painful aftermath...hang in there!

[Zen]

I am very very lucky that I didnt end up worse off

I can't decide if that's an understatement or an overstatement. How awful!The knee part is particularly cringe inducing