#15 How To Break a Femur

Salutations.
Yesterday kicked off week 4/16 for Mohican 100 miler

PA Gamelands
18k 100 minutes

Time traveling gear.

The plan was to run 30k, but my knee that was bothering me is still aching pretty bad. It feels slightly better when I run than when I am stiff legging it around. As I laid in bed yesterday evening, unable to bend my left leg, I booked my room for the 25k this weekend. That way I am sure to go to the necessary measures to heal my leg up enough to survive 15.5 miles of trail racing Saturday. Key word- racing. My plan! - Day off today, because we got snow again last night, ain't no body got time for that; or bronchitis. Then I will just stick to flat roads/ rail trails all week. I don't want to see a trail until Saturday because I know that race is going to muff up my knee even more. And I am fine with that. Spirits are still high, 3 months away from the MO100. While lying in bed and trying to bend my leg, it brought back a certain memory. Of another time in my life when I had trouble bending my other like. Also, someone requested this story on the last blog. What can I say, I am a man of the people.. Throw back on those fake 3-D glasses, we are heading back to 2008 to show you how one breaks a femur. Actually, there will be a prologue in 2004ish because I think the first damage was done then.

2004ish- Mary Lou Retton Park

Baseball was probably my second favorite sport growing up; behind basketball. There was one game out of the hundreds that I played from 6-15 yrs old that stands out quite vividly. It was the only game where I did not finish, first DNF of my life. I remember already being intimidated by the opposing pitcher's speed and he had already rung me up once that day; not much of an accomplishment. I stood in the box and he freaking whipped a pitch right at me. I attempted to jump and kick my legs out over the plate to avoid the pitch, but only succeeded with one leg. The ball traveled right behind my left leg and pounded my right leg right above my knee cap. Down goes Frazier. And now he's rolling around. And crying. And crying more. This is getting embarrassing. I remember the feeling of not being able to walk for the first time. I tried to stand up and just couldn't put any pressure on my right leg. I eventually hobbled to the dugout and sat rest of that game out. I couldn't walk normal for close to a week and had the gnarliest bruise that I've ever seen above my knee. That was probably when I stopped aspiring to play baseball for the rest of my life. Though I did continue to struggle through another 4-6 years.

Summer of 2008

This summer would be the first summer where I actually ran regularly with Patrick and Dave. After getting beat by a lot of people during freshman cross country and track, I had motivation to get better. It's extremely common to see a high school runner have a huge jump from mediocrity to less mediocre. My jump came the summer of 2008. I was running every single day and seeing very quick progress. I just attended my first running camp, Camp of Champions in Madison Wisconsin. I got to talk to Chris Solinsky, Evan Jager, Simon Bairu, and thee Jerry Schumacher. Allow me to translate that into mainstream sports talk. I got to talk to Michael Jordan, Barry Sanders, Derek Jeter and thee Coach K. That camp started an obsession with UW that I didn't kick for three years. That summer was probably the summer that I spent the least amount of time indoors. If I wasn't running I was playing ultimate frisbee. I played that shit every day and for hours. There were different groups that I would play with; occasionally everyone would be free and we would play 100 yd games of 12 on 12. Those were awesome. The obsession with ultimate, some might say, led to my biggest athletic setback. 

8/8/08

I never followed the Olympics too closely, but then again I was only 12 for the '04 Olympics and had other shit going on like Roller Coaster Tycoon and trying to catch Pokemon. I chose to watch damn near every event that took place in the Beijing Olympics. Granted, I didn't have too much going on. I remember my dad driving me to cross country practice as the opening ceremonies kicked off. In August Fairmont Senior used to have 'hell month' where we'd have a daily second practice every evening that was optional, but saw the majority attend. Back then we wanted to get better and ran twice a day and played frisbee every evening as a team. On this night for some reason none of the guys brought their frisbee. We were just going to run and go home. The girls team had a couple frisbees though and they wanted to play a game. At that time I would never turn down a game of frisbee. I probably enjoyed that more than running. I want to say hindsight 20/20 I should have just run, but if I could do it all over, I'd make the same mistake.

Very early on in the game, like first five minutes, Chris (my coach) grabbed the frisbee and I shot off for the endzone. Very routine play. He made the long pass and I made the catch multiple times a game. The teams were co-ed. My older sister came out for the cross country team that year. Being on the same team we thought would be fun; it was. Meaghen is a few inches taller than me and that had a lot to do with the outcome of this game. Once Chris threw the pass I opened up into full stride after it; as did Meaghen on defense. While at top end speed, my right leg was firmly planted in the turf. It's funny...this story is actually getting hard for me to type; hands are shaking. Meaghen charged on and we would have had a knee on knee collision if we were the same height. Her knee smashed into my planted leg and sent me head over heels. I honestly can't explain the feeling. All I know is that I tried to hop up as quick as I could. That's what everyone does when they get knocked down. I hopped on my left leg, but couldn't move my right leg. Not like- my leg is asleep and I can't move it. I literally had no way of moving my leg. I laid back down and quickly tried to bend it. Then I looked at it and my knee cap was not where it usually was. It now rested against my calf. That's enough to make a kid lose his shit, and that I did. Gripping the turf, pulling the turf out, and screaming every curse word I knew and more was all that I could do. I remember looking around into the eyes of everyone else that was playing. I could confirm that it was bad from the looks they projected. Tears just rolling, anger everywhere. I also remember wishing that Patrick didn't have work that night. He wasn't at practice and I wished that he was there to keep me calm. Chris sprinted over to my side and ended up scooping me up and taking me 90+ yards back to my dad's truck so we could go to Weenie Hut General. I couldn't stop vibrating. My entire body was shaking so viciously. I thought I was going to black out when Chris was running with me. Every step he took my leg just kept bouncing up and down and I couldn't do anything, it was like a ragdoll.

We get to Fairmont General. I am still talking like a sailor. This was the first time that I hated the world. I remember being bitter and probably sounding more like Nancy Kerrigan than I am proud of. After sitting around in that stupid place for forty five minutes I got news that I was being transferred to a real hospital in Morgantown because Fairmont General only handles nosebleeds. At that time I must have transitioned into another stage of dying. Because all I could do was apologize to the pair of teammates that was there and Chris. Up to that point I thought that I just had a dislocated knee. When I was told that I also snapped my femur in half...That's the death penalty to a runner. I felt so guilty for ruining my team's season. We had a real good shot at the podium as a team that year; granted it was a very weak year for AAA teams. Nonetheless, I couldn't have felt worse. Physically, mentally, emotionally. The only good that came and to this day I can't remember if it was in Fairmont General, the ambulance ride to Ruby Hospital in Morgantown or once we got in to Ruby. I remember some guy told me to count backwards from 10 as he injected me with something. Even in the worst pain of my life, I could still muster up enough energy to be an asshole. I said- I hate when I see this on television. Go ahead, give it to me. No way I fall to sleep before counting back from 10. It's ten seconds. 10. 9. 8... I woke up sixteen hours later.

Company for the majority of my stay at Ruby.

The handful of nurses that dealt with me for my stay at Ruby deserve a raise. I am not sure if I have ever been a bigger prick in my life. Whenever my friends weren't in my room as was quite salty. But I do/did have some excellent friends. The final blow was when my surgeon told me that I shouldn't expect to ever run as fast as I did before the break. First thought was- Damn, I have never even run fast before. Never going to be fast. Then my second thought that lingered around too long: game over, I quit. I fully accepted my fate and end to a running career that never began. Honestly, I went into the darkest place that I have ever been to; or it was my first time in the room. That's probably more accurate. The worst part was that I gave up, but that's it. I didn't talk about it. It happened, it was supposed to, drop it. But my sister took it soo much harder than I did. She felt so terrible about it that I actually felt bad that I was making her feel bad about breaking my femur...Weird. Looking at these pictures makes me wish that I could grow hair again. But that's a different story completely.

I did go to a dark place, but it could have been so much darker. I had so much support from everyone. People sent me delicious food, reached out to me, gave me cards. I only wish that I was grateful at the time. I was still bitter enough to not care that people were being so good to me. Like I said, I was a prick. I also has the closest thing to a motive to be a prick though. Two people that I wouldn't have made it through without are Chris and my best/female friend at the time. There were dozens that contributed to my mental and emotional recovery, but these two for some reason hit me the deepest. I had been best friends with this girl for a few years, sweetest girl in the world. I made some mistakes and didn't care. We weren't on great terms when I broke my leg, but man... Almost daily she would visit after soccer practice, bake me goodies, and come over and make sure that I was doing alright. We would play games that she didn't want to play and watch movies and just chat. There is no way I could repay or thank her enough for being there for one of the hardest times in my life. I tried my best to thank her by continuing to be a prick... I have no regrets in my life, but if I did one of them wouldn't certainly be down that alley. She'll always have a spot as the coolest chick ever. And I will leave it at that.

Few months after broken leg.

Chris wasn't around almost everyday. He was there daily. There wasn't one day that I was in that cast (2 months) that Chris didn't not visit me on. Right out of the hospital I was handed fifty Oxycontins. I took one, it knocked me out for six hours. I woke up and took another. That was the first couple of days of therapy. Then Chris made sure to always keep me company. He offered to take me to every morning and evening practice, I didn't want to go to either. So in between practices he would come to my house and play Madden with me. We logged several seasons that month. That gave me something to look forward to everyday and something to keep me away from my Oxys. Eventually I did accept the invite to a practice and slowly weaved myself back into the team. But Chris continued to come by and play video games. At that point (September) he was just coming because we had gotten too into our Madden dynasties; I didn't need help staying awake anymore. And if I never broken my leg, he never would have come up to game and all the hours we logged of NHL 09/10/11 never would have happened. Nor would we have picked up the hobby of disc golf. So that is one of many good things to come out of breaking my femur. So if you think you have had a good school coach before, think if he would go out of his way daily to make sure that you are alright for a month. There is a reason Fairmont Senior used to be killers in running. Couldn't of had a strong family vibe on the team then.

Year later, back to being killers.

That cross country season I learned that I was truly in love with the sport of running. When you can't move your leg for two months and have to watch your friends run daily; you either get bored or really anxious. I got very anxious. I had a new level of passion for running and spent the season with Chris as the assistant coach. I got to see the other side of the sport. I got to help make workouts and see the team through the eyes of a coach. I really enjoyed that side of it. I would get more nervous watching my team run than I would when I would toe the line myself. Because at that point I made the decision that if I ever get the opportunity to race again that I would be hard to break. I figured that I will never feel as much pain as I already had felt with my injury so it'd be hard for competitors to hurt me. And I think that over the next few years that I proved to be a tough opponent for most of the kids that I raced. No one had more fire burning, that's for sure. I still haven't decided if that worked in my favor all of the time. I think the biggest thing I learned about high school running is how easily people broke in races. How soft everyone is. But at the end of the race- everyone has that last gear to sprint in significantly faster than they were traveling. I kept that in my mind and promised myself that I wouldn't have any gears left when I finished. Leave nothing out there. And I would recommend to any high school runner, especially a struggling runner, to go to meets and just watch races. It will help if you want it to. I picked up an attitude during my therapy that I never really dropped in high school. It was an acquired taste.

One of the first to greet me after winning state.

Speaking of therapy, I feel like I can not leave that out of the story. Derek at Fairmont's Country Roads Physical Therapy is the man! I can remember getting my cast sawed off and being naive, I went to hop off of the table and was crushed when my leg couldn't bend still. Also, I was curious as to why my surgeon took the time to shave my leg for the screws to go in my leg but left my leg all bloody. I had raunchy ass blood stains all up my leg. And I initially woke up naked and confused, but we have allllll been there. Back to therapy. I like to think that I was one of the hardest patients that Derek has ever had to deal with. Everything hurt. I hated having to hold someone's hand and basically learn how to walk all over again. I didn't have too much pride, it just really annoyed me. I had vivid memories of walking just fine. The pain eventually felt good. I spent three straight days just murdering the stationary bike. Then I thought- this is stupid. And Derek had to stand over my shoulder or I wouldn't do it. He would yell at me whenever he would go help someone else and turn around to see me texting instead of biking. ' I don't want to get good at riding bikes, I hate bikes' I remember telling him. The most pain I felt in therapy is when he would strap ankle weights to my ankle and make me extend my leg over the table. There was two options- the ankle weights force my leg to bend which it wasn't planning on doing, or I use my non-existent leg muscles to hold it up strong. And when Derek would stretch my leg I would almost cry every single day. Granted, bending my leg at first would consist of about four inches of movement. It was pretty stiff for a few weeks. I remember that I HATED doing any balancing drills. Shit, I don't have the best balance now. When I was crippled I could fall over by the wind blowing. There was this one drill where I would balance on my new leg and toss a medicine ball against a trampoline that was angled to sent it back to my chest. I was so pissed to be doing it again that I threw it like a basketball to a teammate that won't stop crying for the ball, and that s.o.b came flying back. Hit me in the chest and I landed flat on my back. Talk about getting what you deserve. That is hilarious to me now, and even made me laugh then. The end of every session was the best. I had 4 patches of electric stimulation hooked up to my quad that would basically force my muscles to flex since I couldn't do that on my own. He would come and hook me up to the machine and leave me there for twenty minutes. Once he left I would sit up and crank that machine to its highest level and just watch my leg spas out. I felt like Drago with all of the sticky things on me. Except he was a monster running up a mountain treadmill and I was trying to bend my leg.

My cast, 2nd evolution.

Derek's peak anger with me came once I had full mobility in my leg. I walked the two miles from school to therapy without crutches and I thought he was going to kill me. I can only think of two funny stories about my crutches. The first time I tried to go down stairs I realized that I had no idea how to do it. I put the crutches two steps below me, you know... to skip steps and get to the bottom faster, and there was no quicker way to the bottom. I picked my legs up and swung down to the crutches and shot way passed them, I skipped a handful of stairs and crashed at the bottom. Luckily my broken leg broke my fall, that cast was rock hard. The other story is in worse taste, but just as funny. I used to drag my right leg everywhere! Hotels, restaurants, meets, everywhere. I would basically sag my entire right side of my body down and drag it around. I remember exiting Olive Garden like that and two hostesses giggled and I snapped around and yelled at them. They apologized. Then the joke ended when I saw some older man struggling as much as I was pretending to. Up until that point, and the few times that I did it after that instance was still hilarious. I went on to never break that femur again so far. I do not have any intentions of doing it again. My most recent tattoo has a dagger going right across my femur where it broke. Didn't plan that to happen, but it's a neat fun fact.

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Today everyone is all dressed up in Green for Josh's birthday! I can honestly say that he is my favorite human roommate.

Happy Birthday Mane!