So this is my great adventure sorry about the length but I will try to make it entertaining and a great read as you follow my pain and suffering thru this experience that I do not wish upon my worst enemy. As some of you may know I have always enjoyed I guess what you may refer to as "extreme sports," I fractured my lower rib 3 years ago mountain biking and I would rather go thru that experience 1,000,000 times than what I am going thru now.
Basically i was at my bosses family cottage on the weekend of the 8th. The Saturday was a poopy day and it finally cleared up that night and we decided to jump in the boat and try some wake boarding. I have always wanted to try this sport and it seemed fun I figured with my snowboarding experience I would have not problem picking up the sport. It took me 2 tries to get on my feet and I was doing pretty good. However on my 4th run, I got hung up on a wake perpendicular to the boat and i was trying to get out of it i tried correcting myself a couple times and then out of no where the board got pulled under water i heard a large "POP!" I fell to the water screaming. They came back around with the boat and thought that I had wiped out and that was it but quickly realized that I had hurt myself. So they first tried pulling me into the boat and well that did not work so my boss and another coworker dove into the lake and undid the straps (That was fun). During this time some people had heard the commotion (me yelling in utter agony) They got us to swim over to their dock as it was lower and it would be easy to pull me out. So once on the dock I went into hypothermic shock (Wearing nothing but a bathing suit and life jacket laying on a cold dock) they loaded me up with blankets and towels, they also game me some ibuprofen and a bit of whisky (I don't think the whisky was a smart thing to do). At this point they discovered that I had broke my femur, it had twisted counter clockwise and the rest of my leg was dangling there.
Ambulance showed up 15 min. later, my leg was flopping around like a dying fish because of the cold. They used a scoop stretcher to load me up. Getting to the ambulance was a joy as it was a crazy up walk uphill and then the drive to the Parry Sound hospital was just as fun going down a lovely cottage road full of potholes, ruts and rocks, also if any of you have driven thru the area you are aware of all the construction. So one of the paramedics sat in the back with me holding my leg and tried to follow the bumps as I chewed on a pillow to prevent myself from passing from the pain as they had not given me any morphine or drugs for the pain. Once at the hospital they gave some drugs for the pain and cut my brand new north face shorts (I was not impressed). They proceed to take me down to the x-ray room and take a couple snap shots of the damage now that that was fun being transfered from table to table I think the whole hospital heard me yelling and cursing.
After that series of great experiences they realized that the damage was to severe and their doctors would not be able to do the surgery. They debated about Sudbury or Hamilton and fought tooth and nail in my drug induced state for Hamilton as I new the doctors would be better for this situation (No offense to Sudbury) but moreover I live there?? So now the weather was looking really bad and they were debating about flying me out via helicopter that night or the next morning. It was decided that it was going to be that night. So they came to me and told me "We are going to put you to sleep so we can straighten your leg for transport". So they gassed me and when I woke up they had inlayed this double leg brace holding me together and were prepping me for shipment like I was a Fed Ex package. So they loaded me up in the ambulance and off we went to the airport. Now on the way to the airport we made it about 3/4 of the way there and the paramedics got a call that the weather was too bad and that they would have to fly me out in the morning and all I could think was "F*CK". So we turn around start heading back to the hospital and we get 3/4 of the way there and guess what the paramedics get another call that went something like this "We got a new weather report and things are looking much better so we are going to take him tonight". All I could think was who the hell is this weather person that you are talking to because I want to rip their arm off and beat them with it!
So we finally make it to the airport the load me up in the helicopter and we take off. I remember part of the ride but I passed out half way thru. I just remember waking up as we were landing at the Hamilton General Hospital, then proceeded for a lovely late night drive thru the beautiful roads of Hamilton to St. Joseph's Hospital. Now as a side note anyone that has driven thru this town will know that if you do not pay attention while driving there is the possibility that you car will fall into one many pits of despair!
So I got admitted to the hospital and when I got to my room it was 2 or 3 in the morning. Slept kinda till the next morning when the specialist came to see me and I then found out that I was going to be operated on at 10 am as I was able to sneak into someone's spot as they were not physically ready to go under. 4 hours later I came out as the 60 million dollar man, faster, stronger, better. I was in recovery for about 2 hours and then was brought back to my room. I stayed in the hospital from August 10th to August 20th at point I went home. I tell most of the nurses were simply amazing, there were 2 that should look at a career in torture the CIA. I also almost punched out a pompous resident doctor for clearly and utterly insulting me, accusing me of being a druggy and telling me that "Life is Pain". Also the food menu was just fabulous I felt like I was staying at the Hilton. The last day and half I barely ate as I could not stomach the imported/nuked things they called food. The best was my last lunch which was called "Tender Veal with a bed of rice" The veal looked like a black squirrel that was scraped off the ground outside the hospital and marinated, but the rice was good.
So now I am on the mend and on the road to recovery. It will be a long one but I have goals set for myself and hope to hit them.
That is my story hope it was a good read, also in intern of all this it has allowed me to quit smoking and drink caffeine. Also brought my family closer. So even thought it was a bad accident and I maybe somewhat mentally and physically damaged there are some positive aspects to this as there are no accidents in life.
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