Steps Forward

My first week of physical therapy for a broken collarbone is complete. I have about five weeks to go if I heal well.

The first week consisted of various up, down, sideways, and diagonal movements with the arm and shoulder. In some exercises I stood and in others I sat. In some exercises I could barely move the arm without pain, while others I completed with relative ease. Some exercises had me hold a towel, others a stick, and others a stretch band.

I do feel that my mobility is already increasing. I also like my physical therapist. My favorite part of physical therapy is actually not the exercises themselves, but rather the connection shared with a therapist. I have better recollection of a long conversation about pizza than I do the specific exercise repetitions I did.

I managed to run four days this week. I am beginning a “building” phase of a marathon training plan. This week only included slow-paced running, most of it done at a perceived effort of “4 out of 10.” The idea is to comfortably accumulate volume and adapt to it. I did not expect to begin training under these circumstances, but that’s life. We play the cards we’re dealt.

The bone aches a bit less with each run and the “bad arm” swings with a little more ease. I felt the bone for every second of the first run, but that aching feeling is already diminishing.

My running performance has frankly been terrible and that’s okay—my conditioning worsened severely over the last month spent in a sling—but I’m also improving a little each day. It’s only natural that the fall occurs much more quickly than the climb. I can tell by my heart rate and pace metrics that I’m adapting well though. The heart rate is steadily lowering while the pace is quickening, and that is just in one week.

After the first run, intense inflammation struck my right foot, the same foot that I sprained a year ago. With each day, though, this seems to ease a little, and subsequent runs haven’t worsened it.

That’s one difficult part about recovering from an injury: you emerge from a cast or sling with a weakened body that is more susceptible to injury. One has to tread carefully to prevent another setback.

I think of a Megadeth song, “Soldier On,” about the innate need to just keep going. Despite a few setbacks, I find myself striving to stand back up again.

Here’s to health in 2023.

Rehabbing a Collarbone Break - Part 1

Today I returned to an Orthopedic doctor to check on the progress of my collarbone break. It had been two weeks since my last visit. The break occurred four weeks ago and I’ve been in a sling ever since.

Obviously, I was hoping that the bone has healed enough to rid the sling and resume normal activity.

I had some initial x-rays done on the bone, and a long wait in a patient room followed. Finally, the doctor entered.

“You’ve healed really well. The bone has reattached successfully, and I see material bonding the break together,” the doctor said (I’m paraphrasing). I cannot recall if he used the word “froth” to describe the material that reattaches bone, but I’m fairly certain it was this word. “You can take off the sling for good.”

The sling is gone! He then had me stand while he inspected the collarbone.

“I don’t see a knob there anymore. That’s a good sign. It looks exactly the same as your left collarbone. That means it really healed well.”

The doctor led me through a series of mobility tests. It was my right collarbone that broke, and my right arm had a fraction of the mobility that my left arm did. I was unable to lift the arm over my head, for example. I felt pain in almost every movement.

“You’ve been wearing the sling well. That’s good,” the doctor said. “The bad news is you have frozen shoulder. All the pain you’re feeling now is from your shoulder, not your bone. It’s from wearing the sling for so long and not moving the arm.”

I agreed to six weeks of physical therapy to regain mobility in my right arm. After six weeks, I’ll have a follow-up appointment with x-rays to confirm that everything has healed perfectly.

“You can perform basic stretching and mobility work, but don’t lift weights. Don’t lift anything more than ten pounds. A can of soda is okay. A gallon of milk is not. The bone is still healing,” the doctor advised.

“How about light running?” I asked.

“Running is fine,” he said. “You’re good for that.” I was relieved to hear that.

“And cycling?” I asked.

“Just don’t fall,” the doctor said with a smile.

I won’t ride a bike for a few weeks regardless. A fall right now would be too catastrophic.

It feels great to be out of the sling. Six weeks of physical therapy hardly seems like the end of the world!

I had a Starbucks latte as a celebratory beverage. I am “active” again and will resume running tomorrow.

Obviously there is still a lot of rehabilitation ahead, but everything could have been worse. The glass is half-full. The bone could have displaced further. That would have required surgery. I could have also had a worse concussion. The mind is a terrible thing to waste. As it was, I regained my senses quickly.

Six weeks! That means my final date of rehabilitation is January 13th, 2023. This is the date that I will have my final appointment with the Orthopedic and final x-rays to confirm that I am healed. Oddly enough, I finished physical therapy in 2021 around the same date. I cannot recall whether the final day was January 13th, but it was very close.

Now here’s to hoping I don’t end 2023 in the same manner!

Inertia

Each significant injury I incur is a harsh reminder that the world not only moves unrelentingly fast, but that it is willing to leave behind those who can’t keep up. Deadlines have no care for broken bones. Project managers are too caught up in the maelstrom of bonuses and performance reviews to consider empathy.

Every one of my daily chores is taking longer to complete, but I find some solace in moving slow. I needed to slow down and catch my breath. If it takes five minutes to throw a shirt on, so be it. If it takes an extra ten minutes to prepare a coffee, there is no loss on my inner wellbeing. It is only external forces that weigh.

Today, according to the forecast, is likely the final warm day of the year. I hope to spend some of it outside.

I’m thinking about my initial inclination to change my cycling habits, and my thoughts of selling my bike. As much as my logical mind believes that to be a good idea, my emotional mind fights back. I think of Robert Marchand, the Frenchman who rode a bicycle beyond age 100. I just need to be vigilant and gain a little skill.

I also think about Christopher Nolan’s Batman films, particularly The Dark Knight Rises.

In an epic fight, Bane crushes Batman’s body and soul. Batman’s back breaks and he is left imprisoned, with little hope of ever escaping. It’s Batman’s memory of his past that gets him out of it. “Why do we fall?” He is asked as a child when he almost fatally falls into a bat cave. The answer is obvious. And over time, he heals his back and climbs out of a prison that is considered impossible to escape.

It was a bicycle crash, and a nasty one. But I don’t think that it will prevent me from getting back on the bike.