The Break

It was Saturday, February 6th. I was biking my badass electric bike to my acupuncture session. Going 20 miles/hr in a pedestrian lane, I hit the curb. BOOM! I am lying on the cold asphalt seeing the world from a different perspective. 

My heavy bike is still between my legs, one of which I can't move.

"I don't think I can get up. Should I call an ambulance? Shoot, I don't have health insurance!" My rational mind was planning an escape route, while my unconscious mind already knew this is a brake. 

Ambulance. Tears. Laughing gas. Hospital.

Lucky for me hospital was not busy, and a beautiful surgeon from Florida came to discuss my x-ray. "I've worked in orthopedic trauma for 20 years, and this is the worst brake I have seen. Nevertheless, I will do everything I can to keep your leg. Your first surgery is scheduled for tomorrow morning."

First surgery??? Keep my leg? Can't you just put a cast on and let me go home? I have no insurance to be in a hospital for long!

Fast forward to today: After 4 surgeries, 2 weeks on a hospital bed, 1 month in my bed, 2 months in a wheelchair, and 1 month on crutches, I have a cute limp and $300000 of medical debt. Yet, Dr. Cannada held her word and kept my leg. She and her team puzzled my tibia bone together like a piece of art. So now I can officially say: “I got screwed”. 

You know, I had lots of time to think about how lucky I am and how lucky I was before the surgeries. We take so much for granted. We waste time, rush, achieve, and then one day - BOOM - we become aware that none of that matters. My trauma did slow me down, and I am thankful it did because I would have kept missing life as it is.

P.S. Thank you to all my caretakers, and mental supporters, I could have done it without you, but you made it a lot easier:)