Recovery Update...and More (Just pay shipping and handling...)

So was finally able to get in some real rides this week to properly test out the leg/hip...I will get into this more later.  First, I have been getting requests to put the injury and ALL pics into one post...so here it is.  Just be aware that some of the pics are not very attractive...not only because they are injury pics which could be considered gross (unless you are an emergency room nurse or doctor...) but they also include me missing some clothing.  Believe it or not this is not me...

Actually, this may be a little more accurate...

 

OK, relax, don’t be offended...

 

If you are really upset with the pics, hopefully you don’t know where to find me...

 

OK, so now that you are properly prepared let’s begin.

So, to backtrack...on June 25^th I took a nasty fall in a race (details are in blog post dated July 6, 2013 titled ‘On Recovery – Riot Down!’). 

I didn’t realise it at the time, but the fall resulted in a torn quad muscle, the vastus lateralis, and soft tissue damage in the area, causing extreme bruising.  Here is the pic at the time...

 

 

 

Because I did not realise the extent of the injury, I continued riding and racing, which prevented the injury from healing properly (falling on it a couple more times likely didn’t help...I know...dumb, dumb, dumb...).  The damaged tissue became infected...resulting in this hematoma...

 

 

Upon visiting the doc, (finally...I know...dumb, dumb, dumb)...I was prescribe antibiotic, and plenty of icing.  So to me, plenty of icing, means icing for as long as I could handle the cold...(I know...dumb, dumb, dumb...).  Sorry, dumbness factor was rather high....I am only human, right?

 

 

As much as Lois believes I'm this guy...

 

 

 

 

Anyways, back to dumbness factor 10... I ended up giving myself severe frostbite...damaging the skin...resulting in the hematoma bursting.  While the burst hematoma felt great (really, the pressure release was a relief!!), it looked rather gross...so you may want to skip this pic...

 

 

 

Anyways, apparently a burst hematoma is a bad thing...a phone call to the doc resulted in a rush appointment.  More antibiotics, and packing the wound with medicated gauze...yes, they shove iodised gauze into the hole caused by the bursting, and into the pocket of skin where the hematoma was...feels great...not.  Then every couple of days, I would have to go back to have the packing removed (feels even better...), then replaced with fresh stuff.  So here is another gross pic...of the packed wound with enough gauze hanging out to give the nurse a good hand-hold to yank it out...

 

 

So after a couple of weeks of antibiotic and packing and re-packing the wound healed enough to look like this...

 

 

 

So now it was a process of simply keeping it covered (and dry), and letting it heal from the inside out...which meant at least another week off the bike.  It finally started to heal over to where it now looks like this...

 

 

The lumpy bits are scar tissue in the once damaged soft tissue under the skin that will have to be physio-therapied away.  By now, the muscle tear is repaired.  So after 6 weeks almost entirely off the bike, this past week saw me get some real bike action in...slowly, and gradually, until Thanksgiving Monday, which called for a full on ride.

This ride was a road ride with Centurion leading the way (see past posts to see just how fast this guy is!!), with me, Jaimie, DundasJim, and CL struggling to keep up.  Fig was out...he's having issues...similar to the Ben Johnson thing...but different.  I started out easing into it to test the injury, and the fact that I am now almost 15 lbs heavier.  Actually, the most interesting thing about this ride is that this was Jaimie’s first ever road ride (like me he is a self proclaimed mountain biker), and he was riding a 12 yr old steel borrowed road bike complete with mountain bike spd pedals...and he kept up!  In fact, he was right up at the front for most of the ride!!  Jaimie has really picked up his game in the mtb race scene this year, and if he starts training on a road bike, will be a force to be reckoned with next season!

Anyways, hopefully that is it for blog posts about this stupid injury...I’m getting complaints...

 

 

 

 

 

 

I promise next one will be on something more fun...like training, or nutrition...quantum physics...spirituality and human consciousness....?  What’ll it be??

Stay posted!!