Tag Archives: Ooowwww!!

So, what’s doing?

July 3, 2010 13:21 | 2 Comments |

Umm… well, right now I’m off the bike. I’ve got a bung knee so the physio I’m seeing has asked I do no long rides this weekend. I’m allowed to commute to work but I have to tape my knee.

My knees started hurting about a week after my bike fit. My seat was put down and it turned out to be too low. I didn’t exactly rush to put it back up which was a bit stupid. The right knee has sorted itself out but the left is giving me grief. One trip to the physio later and it tuns out my patella has been scraping the tendons underneath it and the muscle on the outside is pulling it off-centre with every turn of the crank. The inside muscle isn’t doing its job of creating equal tension so my patella doesn’t move from side to side.

Kate – the physio – said she doesn’t think it’s too bad (she said she’d seen a lot worse) but it does need correcting. So now I have to flex my quaddie 100 times whilst tapping the inner muscle. Weird huh? Apparently the tapping sends a message to my brain to grow the muscle. I also have to tape my knee if I’m going to get on my bike. I’ve been cleared to continue riding to work but I’m not allowed to do any long rides at all. *pouts* She also thinks I may have a Baker’s cyst. These aren’t dangerous at all as it’s just a pouch of fluid that’s formed at the back of my knee. There’s not a lot I can do about it anyway except rest it and take some ibuprofen to get the inflammation down. I’m sure all will be revealed and hopefully resolved with treatment.

I have a sneaking suspicion that both my patellas get pulled to the outside of my knees but it’s never hurt before so perhaps it’s being pulled a little further than normal.

I chose a sports physio this time as I figured my knee is a sport-related injury. Knees are tricky too so I thought it’d be better to see someone who was more likely to be familiar with their problems. But lordy, did she hurt me or what? She did a thing called a muscle strip from my hip to my knee and I nearly cried. Basically, it’s her running her fingers down my leg as hard as she can right over over the bone to break up the muscle fibres. This forces the muscle to relax but holy crap, It was painful!! I’m also sporting a rather lovely bruise at the moment where she did the most work. Haven’t decided if it helped or not as it still hurts. I’m supposed to roll a tennis ball down my leg as hard as I can but I decided I’m going to wait until the bruising heals.

The scary thing is that she said she wasn’t even doing it that hard. The pros would get it done infinitely harder than what she did to me. I also think I detected a note a slight note of satisfaction in her voice when she said that. Perhaps I should be worried…

As for the house hunting, well lets not talk about that. Every time I think about it, I end up with this slight feeling of PANIC!! Looked a place today that was okay and am about to go see another. This one I think I really want so I’ve already filled in the application form. Hopefully that will put me at the top of the pile.

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Uuummmm, about that plan…

April 23, 2010 23:57 | Leave a Comment |

I did manage to get up on Tuesday and go for a ride. I even felt like I’d achieved something as I managed to ride the entire length of Yarra Boulevard for the first time in ages. And best of all, I ran into my brother. Not literally because that would’ve been bad. Apparently he also rides Yarra Boulevard every Tuesday so I may be seeing more of him. He, of course, can totally kick my arse on hills so if he does ride with me he’s going to have to slow down. Or maybe I could attach a rope to him and he can drag me up the hills 😉

I also went to cardio boxing on Wednesday night. Everything was going swimmingly until it came to doing some kicking with the crash pad. I don’t know what I did about about half way through I was hopping around the park, grimacing in pain. Somehow I managed to strain my left calf muscle. At first it felt like a cramp but the pain wouldn’t go away even when I stretched it out. So much for my plan. I optimistically set my alarm for 6am Thursday morning but simply moving my leg while still lying in bed told me I wasn’t going anywhere. Which really sucked because it was a perfect morning for a ride. Oh well, hopefully there will be other perfect mornings that I won’t have to skip.

Funnily enough I woke up this morning at 5:45 and thought about getting up for a ride. But I decided I should rest my calf and not risk damaging it even more because as far as I can tell, Yarra Boulevard isn’t kind to injured bodies. I have the weekend to rest up and my calf does feel better this time today than it did yesterday. Hopefully by Monday it’ll be all good as I have plans to ride to Black Rock. What better way to spend a public holiday? Get up early and jump on the bike!! Sleep in? What’s a sleep in?

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Back in the saddle

February 27, 2010 00:13 | Leave a Comment |

Took Lisa out for a spin today and it felt really good. I was definitely slower than normal but it just felt good to ride again.

Unfortunately it looks like I’ve busted the bike computer I was given. The display still works but there’s no data being received so I think I’ve damaged the cable which means it’s ka-put. I’m just glad I didn’t have my accident on my new bike. That would’ve really sucked if I’d damaged my bike and Garmin!

I need to get new handle-bar tape because what’s on there now is ripped right where my fingers rest. It doesn’t look that bad but I know it’ll annoy me. Not sure how I managed to do it on both sides!!

My ribs don’t hurt quite so much these days. They’re still painful and I need to be careful but it’s nowhere near as bad as what it was. My bruises are fading too. The one on my knee has spread out and it looks really ugly but at least it’s stopped bleeding. Still hurts though so I have to be very careful to not whack it into anything otherwise it’ll tear again.

I know I was extremely lucky. I’ve been thinking about it a lot and I realised that if I stayed in the bike path on the inside, the other car would’ve definitely hit me and I’d be in much worse shape than I am. Going on the outside probably saved me from serious injuries, including a broken leg. It’s not much consolation but torn rib tendons and bruises are a much better outcome than a broken leg.

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I’m such a baby

February 21, 2010 14:48 | 2 Comments |

I don’t do well with injuries. Not well at all. It feels like someone has taken to the left side of my chest with a hammer. I’m really feeling it today. Every time I take a deep breath or move, a sharp stabbing pain radiates out from my chest. Lying down and getting up is excruciating. I have no idea if this is normal or how long I’m going to feel like this. The doctor at the hospital probably told me but I was so whacked out of my head on morphine, I can’t remember. (A quick google search says it’ll hurt for at least six weeks and the pain is normal.) I suppose what’s worrying me slightly is that I have pain in my back but it’s probably referred pain from the rib. It’s in line with the injury site so it would seem normal for the pain to be spreading out.

The bruises are coming out now. My left knee isn’t swollen any more which indicates the bleeding has finally stopped but the whole side of my knee is one giant and painful bruise. Yay for hematomas! I have a spectacular bruise on my right arm which I’m not 100% sure how I got. I don’t remember putting my arms out in an effort to break my fall (sure fire way to break your collar bone!) but I probably did it anyway.

Hospitals are not fun places to be on your own. It’s not fun to be in pain and surrounded by strangers. Admittedly those strangers were there to help me but mostly I wanted someone I knew to hold my hand and tell me it was going to be okay. I have no concept of how long I was by myself but it felt like forever. Being in a totally unfamiliar place that smells funny, unable to move because of a neck brace is actually really scary. It wasn’t helped by the fact that somewhere nearby there was a guy who would yell in pain about every ten minutes. Turns out he had a dislocated knee but he was resisting treatment. People do weird things when they’re in pain.

Familiar voices make such a huge difference. Even in my morphine induced blur, I felt better when I had people I knew nearby. After I panicked when I though I was going to throw up but couldn’t move, having my friend take my hand and rub my arm was hugely comforting.

It’s funny, I find this whole thing really hard to write about. I don’t cope well with being injured. It was scary being carted off in an ambulance. It was really scary after I’d hit the ground and recovered from the initial shock that my ribs started hurting and wouldn’t stop. I know I’m lucky that I wasn’t seriously injured and I know I’m lucky that I’m not hospital. But why do I feel so… traumatised by it? Is it because I’m just a big baby who needs to harden up?

I have to find a way to deal with the pain in my ribs because it’s going to be there for awhile. They can’t be instantly fixed.

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Really wasn’t on my list of things to do last night

February 19, 2010 15:28 | Leave a Comment |

Today I’m sporting a likely cracked rib, a bruised and slightly swollen left knee and I’ve got a few bruises popping up. The chest x-rays didn’t show an obviously broken a rib but the doctor was fairly certain I have a hairline fracture which won’t show up.

Hitting a car on the way home from work last night really wasn’t on my list of things to do. What was getting some takeaway from the local Japanese place and sitting on the couch. There may have also been time set aside for eating what’s left of the open bag of peanut butter m&ms. (I was having a bad day okay!)

So yes… I hit a car. It’s kinda hard to explain. I think it was at the intersection of Canning and Richardson St. Two cars. One next to me who was turning left and one crossing Canning on Richardson. The guy on Canning had stopped and left space for me to get by. I think he edged forward or took his foot off the brake and I decided it would be better to go around him on the outside. But the car driver on Richardson thought the one on Canning had stopped for him so he went. I saw this, tried to brake but was going too fast and ended up rapidly decelerating by slamming into the back of the car. My bike kinda jack-knifed and I went over the frame instead of the handlebars. Ended up a crumpled mess on the road, coming down on my left side which I’d just rammed into the car.

First time in my life I’ve had morphine. Not sure I like it that much. It’s great at deadening the pain but it made me feel sick. I’m also really not keen on the neck collar. It just hurt my jaw and I was so glad to have it taken off when they finally removed it. The time at the hospital is actually a bit of a blur. Mostly I just felt sick until they gave me some really good anti-nausea drugs after I had my x-rays.

I did discover that my resting heart rate is actually quite low. While I was lying in the hospital, it got down into the low 40s. That’s probably lower than normal for me as I was doped up on morphine but it never really got above 50. I had the doctor come in and start checking my head and neck but as soon as she touched my head, my body temperature shot up and I was certain I was going to vomit. But I still had the neck brace on so they had to page a bunch of people to come in and roll me on my side. And then I didn’t vomit. All that effort for nothing. I was hooked up a heart monitor during this ordeal (panicking whilst wearing a neck brace and unable to move on your own is freaken scary) but my friend who was with me said my heart only got up to 56. So, obviously I’m fitter than I thought I was. Not exactly comforting but kinda good to know.

I’ve never hurt my ribs before. It’s not something I’d recommend to anyone. It hurts to take a deep breath, it hurts to laugh, cough and even burp. Sitting upright is more comfortable than lying down but it still hurts.

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