Week Eleven: “Rolling into the sunset, like a cowboy.”

(11 weeks post break / 10 weeks post ORIF)

This was it! The last week I would be in a leg cast! Next week, I would be upgraded (downgraded?) to an air-cast/boot! I was excited about the prospect of being able to walk. I was excited about being able to take off the boot to shower, to sleep, to DRIVE!! 

11.5 weeks, 6 casts, and 2 surgeries later:
And all I got are these stinky canvases!

I couldn’t wait to not be a 3-ring circus everywhere I went! I just wanted to be a normal person, going about my daily activities: without people following me around to hold doors, offer to carry things, give me pitying stares and half-hearted offers of assistance.

I couldn’t wait to be far from the prying eyes and judgmental stares of colleagues and friends who were not aware of the whole situation. No, I had not been on vacation for nearly 3 months. Far from it! Not only did I have to work full-time (at home and in the office), but I also had to work twice as hard to portray some sort of independence, and power through those painful days, and those especially horrible days in which I would all but break out in tears at any given task.

At this point, pain was my normal. It did not bother me, because it was mild and minimal. The worst of the pain was behind me (after my ORIF), even though this entire ordeal was still a pain in my behind... The screw removal was also behind me, which was not as painful as the original procedure. Even though I had not put any weight at all on my healing leg, I felt strong. I felt like I could, if I had to. But I didn’t. I didn’t want to be proven wrong. I wanted to be ridiculously optimistic, and unbelievably confident.

…

In my last week of the fiberglass cast, I focused on getting past that hurdle. I took my first steps. Each step was spent cursing my doctor. Yes, he had said that I could bear weight as tolerated. But for some reason, he had not considered that when he positioned my foot and placed the cast on. I looked like a peg-legged ostrich, trying to walk on an uneven cast, and an unusual positioning of my leg and foot. As my steps looked ridiculous, and caused my knee to hurt, and my hips to be strained (due to the positioning of the cast), one thing was an extremely happy surprise: my ankle did not hurt.

Come at me, bro! 

I only pushed myself to walk within the comfort of my own home. I would not venture outside without my trusty scooter or my faithful iWalk. I still relied on my mobility devices very heavily, and even continued to use my scooter at home (only walking when I had to go a very short distance- i.e. to the bathroom, or kitchen). I still elevated my leg while I slept (as I had done, every night, since the injury). I was determined to be the most extraordinary post-ORIF patient of all time! I wanted to impress my doctors, and my friends & family!

No lines, no wait, just the VIP treatment!

As week 11 came to an end, I cherished the opportunity to relax as often as I wanted. I took my last chance to use my ankle as an excuse to avoid things I did not want to do. I treated myself to naps and Netflix. I ate ice cream for breakfast, and did not apologize for being unable to do something. I stopped caring about what others thought when they saw me, and decided to roll with anything that came my way! And I rolled and rolled and rolled, like a cowboy riding into the sunset on his knee-scooter named “Moustache”.

I would make the best of my last few days of ‘limitations’, and hit the ground running (or more likely, walking) as soon as the hard cast came off next week!

In the meantime, I rolled.

Yee-Haw!!