Originally posted by 4thefight
How many bones did you break?
Not nearly as many as you. I honestly don't remember all the stuff they worked on. It was by now almost 20 years ago, and I just never paid much
attention to it, but my right arm was broken up through the skin, my shoulder torn out of socket, minor concussion, some ribs broken, more yet
cracked. Some internal bleeding, and something to do with the lung, but not a puncture. I'd have to ask my mom, she'd remember better than I would.
The ribs were the worst. I was extremely lucky for two main reasons: one, almost the entire impact was absorbed by my right arm and ribs, and two, the
fact that I hit a tree sticking out from a cliff, since there was enough angle to absorb a lot of energy from the fall, and to keep me from
"bouncing" off of it, and hooked enough (it was at a wierd angle coming out of the cliff, but then went upward) to "catch" me. It was really a one
in a million shot.
Originally posted by 4thefight
That was messed up that they would not treat you because you didn't have a credit card.
Yeah, let that be a warning to any skiers out there, always carry a credit card with you on American slopes. Heh... heh...eh...
Originally posted by 4thefight
What really got me is that almost the exact same thing ran through our minds as we went over the edge.
Yeah, that was one of the reasons I responded actually. I guess it's one of those "Well, there's just nothing I can do about it now, so I might as
well accept it" sorta things. I mean, there was no one to beg for my life from, and there was no one to impress by having false hope. I just knew
that was it, this is how I die, and it was surprisingly easy to accept, and gave me the most astounding sense of calm when I accepted it. I can only
hope that one day, when ol' Grim comes to collect his due, that I can be as calm.
Originally posted by 4thefight
Does it bother you to relive what happened to you. I know I was typing my story up last night it was almost as if reliving it. Does that happen to
you?
Strangely, no. Of course at the time it was horrible, but within a couple of years, I was more or less fully healed and had gone a while without
thinking about what happened. Then when visiting family in another city, they asked me to tell them about the skiing accident. As I got near the end,
where the banana flipped over, my uncle burst out laughing, which broke the tension in the room, and everyone sorta laughed, then laughed more when
they heard about the minister and the credit card incident. Laughter does wonders for the soul.
So it's kind of become one of those "I can look back on it and laugh now". I expect that had I suffered any serious permanent disability from it,
the story might be different. But where I've had the worst reaction to it is, oddly enough, when I'm falling asleep.
I will often get a "falling" sensation as I'm drifting off to sleep. And sometimes, it will couple with an "almost" dream about falling off that
cliff all over again, minus the calm, just dread fear. That and I now get pretty bad vertigo. I don't so much have a fear of heights as I do a
problem keeping my balance when standing on ground much higher than what I'm looking at. Still, these are fairly minor inconveniences that have
allowed me to otherwise live a normal life.
Originally posted by sizzle
Libra,
As I said in the opening of this thread, there are many heroes here on ATS, but this was the first that I have heard your awesome story...
I feel as though I stand in the shadow of some very courageous people here. Or should I say, "Giants?"
Honestly, my fall didn't take an ounce of courage or heroism on my part, unless you count renting discount skis to be courageous. All it required was
me being dumb enough to rent cheap gear, and then being too clumsy to make it down the slope without falling. The rest was really math and me
screaming a lot. :LOL: I appreciate the vote of confidence though.
Originally posted by sizzle
I am a chronic-pain patient and felt like I have exercised monumental control by not giving in to the 'pain-medication route.' But in comparison to
you guys and what you have endured....I feel like a whiney baby! LOL!
Not at all!!! My pain was relatively short term. It seemed like a million years at the time, but honestly, the worst was over by the time I got the
cast on and everything. The ribs hurt for a very long time afterward, and occasionally still do, but that's really it.
Chronic pain is, IMHO, far worse than broken bones. I got a dry-socket after a root canal a year or so back, and got a taste of what chronic pain
feels like. It was this horrible throbbing pain that just radiated out through my entire body, and no amount of medication did anything to stop it,
even Lortab and Darvocet. It went on for days, each day worse than the last. It was like every movement, every action, was in slow motion, and that
motion was through very painful jello. It was crippling. There's no other word for it, crippling.
Then when I called the dental surgeon and he said "Oh, you've got a dry socket, come right in, we'll fix it up", and he tamped a nasty tasting
swab into the hole, it was better in minutes, and gone within a couple of hours. It was more than a great weight being lifted, it was like a whole new
lease on life, a whole new vantage point about just how good I had it.
If anything, Sizzle, you and Badge01 are the heroes. Chronic pain is an indescribably horrible thing to suffer from, and I sincerely hope they one day
find a cure for what ails y'all.
