I broke my knee

At the end of last year’s snowboarding season, I fractured my thumb and had to wear a stupid thumb cast for weeks. This year, I broke my knee.

I was avoiding a jump in a terrain park and then fell into a giant hole that was right next to it. The fall didn’t hurt too much but it hurt a lot to stand back up. I thought I pulled a muscle or something, and was able to painfully snowboard the rest of the run AND go back up and do a green run again, until I couldn’t handle the pain anymore. It hurt every time I put weight on it.

I sat in the lodge from 12:30 to 6 pm alone and in pain while all my friends had fun. We then went to eat pho and I didn’t get home until 9 pm. By this point of the night, I could no longer walk limp or stand. I decided to go to the hospital.

Some of you may ask me: why didn’t you go to the medical center right away?

1. my knee wasn’t swollen or bruised so I didn’t think I needed medical attention
2. I do think they are useless based on my last year’s experience. When I went to them for my swollen and purple thumb, they gave me an empty ziploc bag and told me to put some snow in it and ice it.

So I spent around 4 hours in my local hospital, a place my mother and literally 4 other people told me not to go to because there will be a giant wait and people have gone in apparently fine and then died there overnight. I told 4 different nurses the same story of what happened. The only thing that changed was how long ago this incident happened (“It was 6 hours ago. It was 7 hours ago. It will be 8 hours ago if I am still here waiting to see a doctor”). I got an X-ray and a CT scan and the conclusion from the ER doctor is that I broke my tibial plateau, a shin bone that connects to the knee.

How the fuck did I manage to go on one more run after my fall? I don’t know. How did I walk all the way back to the car from the lodge? I don’t know.

So I pay for a knee brace ($37) and crutches ($24) and I am finally free to go home at 2 am with instructions to receive a call from a specialist in the next few days. I insist on taking a shower because we went snowboarding and the hospital is disgusting, only to realize it’s damn hard to get into a bath tub with only one good foot.

Some of you may know that my parents are away this month. My dad is in HK and my mom is living her best life in a resort in Thailand. They were very worried and even considered coming back home to take care of me. My sister and I reassured them that I will be fine but I felt really bad about it because it felt like I was ruining their vacation.

I’ve been stuck at home for the last 4 days and here are my biggest struggles and adventures as a crippled person:

• Going up and down the stairs with crutches. My two methods are scooting up and down on my bum, or – if my right leg feels strong enough – I kind of hop on one foot the whole way. It’s pretty scary because if I lean too far back I will fall backwards. If I lean too far forward I will fall head first.
• Making cereal for myself. My friend brought me a jug of milk that expires in 7 days. The cereal was on my dining room table but I struggled getting all the other pieces. I can’t carry anything with my hands while on crutches, so I had to put a spoon in my pocket, bite a bowl in my mouth, and then slide the jug of milk on the floor and push it with my crutches until I could sit down, put my crutches away and pick up the milk with my hands.
• Showering. Hard to get in and out of the tub. It’s also tiring to stand on one leg the entire time.
• Nutritional food. All I have in my fridge is a bunch of rabbit food – salad, baby carrots and hummus, etc. Now that I have a bone injury, I’m supposed to eat more fish and beef which I have none of and I don’t know how to make them.

My biggest struggle is my emotional instability. I already felt pretty useless this month because my parents are away and I am terrible at being an adult. Now I struggle with even the most mundane tasks, like putting on underwear. Lord forbid I need help with that.

Another thing that has been making me really sad is that I will have to cancel my Japan trip in April. I was really looking forward to it, but with a broken bone, 4 weeks is not a realistic healing time. Our hotels also say “non-refundable cancellation” which is really stressing me out and we can’t seem to speak to anyone through the customer service hotline.

My sister and boyfriend have been amazing in the last few days, cooking for me and helping me with things I can’t do. They call themselves “Team slave” which is basically true and I am going to do nothing to refute that.

My boyfriend has also been extremely comforting about all my emotions. He said we could get a wheelchair and still go to Japan because apparently Japan is handicap friendly. This idea still doesn’t seem very fun to me (how am I going to take pictures???) but if we can’t get our money back maybe this is the next best thing.

Him being so nice to me also makes me super emotional because it re-emphasizes how shitty and useless I feel right now. I am very grateful for him and how much he is helping my sister and I through this injury. I think my parents don’t want to stress me out so they message him and my sister instead and he has been dealing with everything very calmly. He has a dog who misses him at home and a mom who can cook him delicious food every night but instead he has to be at my house taking care of me, which kind of sucks if you have to do it for a long time.

In general I just feel super cranky and terrible. I know this is not a good time for any of us. I am not at work this week even though I have a big project I need to be working on. This also stresses me out. It doesn’t feel like I am resting since I am still uncomfortable at home with painkillers and on top of this, I am super bored.

I do want to thank all my friends and colleagues and even random people for asking me how I am and wishing me a speedy recovery. After seeing the specialist this week, it’s confirmed that I do not need a surgery because my bone is not displaced, but I am looking at a 5 week healing period with more weeks after that for a full recovery. They made me purchase a new knee brace that costs $255, of which I only get 50% reimbursed because I chose the minimum medical coverage, assuming I wouldn’t get hurt this year. My cheap ass is very much tormented over this purchase.

Until then, protect your knees and send me food (or money).

Sincerely, Loewe