As someone who’s endured a long hospital stay, I can tell you: it ain’t no fun.
Alex’s injuries are based on those of a close, personal friend of mine, who laid his bike over most egregiously one day outside of Austin. He also recovered, and is still riding today.
On a lighter note: More Psychostick? Don’t mind if I do! They have one burning question to ask you:
Agreed, man.
I’ve done overnight in a hospital, from ‘standard’ surgery, and that wasn’t any fun, either.
Especially since morphine apparently doesn’t work on me.
I dropped one at about 60mph and ate the guard rail. I’m thankful I walked away from that with nothing more than a torn tendon in a finger, a cracked rib and massive amounts of bruising. Friends have come to a lot more grief at lower speeds.
I’ve spent a week in hospital for other things and I’m glad my room mates were just as mad as me. Soft toys turned into projectiles, which is not the behaviour expected of 40+ year olds.
“That which does not kill us leaves us with scars.”
AMEN TO THAT. Early-onset breast cancer left me with nonfeeling tits and a scar from hip to hip from the reconstruction surgery (although I’m mostly all me still!), and one helluva readjusted scale of what actually matters in my life. Amazing how you no longer have fucks to give about social drama when you’ve dripped poison into your veins for 5 months and will never have useable abdominal muscles again. Emotionally aged about 10 years in the space of 8 months, I think, and that part I don’t regret a bit.
My mother is the same way. She was diagnosed with ovarian cancer in her late 40s, which they caught just barely in time. After surgery and a whole lot of chemo, she pulled through against the odds, but not without a lot of lasting physical effects. (This was almost 20 years ago now.) It gave her a much different look at life. She enjoys it more, and is more likely to go new places and try new things, and worry less about things that won’t matter down the road. She had straight blonde hair before her cancer, which she dyed to hide what I refer to on myself as “light blond” hair. Now, she has curly salt-and-pepper hair, and will tell you she’s still happy to have hair at all; that’s the perspective she has on her whole life.
Kethry, if you haven’t already, you should find a cancer support group around you and help some people who are going through what you’ve already been through. People in the middle of it can benefit a lot from talking with people who have come out the other side scathed but intact.
Yea, I should…although probably after I’ve adjusted to the the tiny tyrant about to take over my life in June. ^_^ I do tend to give out my email to folks who I meet that have been diagnosed, just been busy with school and such lately. Finding a support group to cheerlead for has taken a bit of a backseat to finishing at least one of my degrees and growing a human, but it *is* on the list…
All this Psychostick has put me in the mood for some Peelander Z.
My bike and I were hit head-on by a truck… while we were sitting stationary at a stoplight!
Earned me a 30-day stay in the hospital (9 of those in ICU) with both shoulders and nearly all of my ribs broken. But no head injury, which seemed to piss off the nurses and doctors since I wasn’t wearing a helmet at the time!?!?
My bike wasn’t as lucky…
Yah, as little as I like the scars, they beat the alternative all to hell and gone.
Four-plus out of the last eighteen months in the hospital do leave just a bit to be desired.
Friend of mine had the transfer case fail on his car as he was going around a turn; all four wheels locked and he went off the road, and was stopped before hitting a river by taking a tree to the driver’s-side door. Pelvis broken, brain torn in three places, coma for close to a month, they weren’t sure he’d ever wake up. He woke up, and had to relearn how to talk, walk, and write. (He was left-handed before the accident–he’s right-handed now.) Then, after years of hard work recuperating, he finished his master’s degree in space systems at one of the top aerospace schools in the US, and now is a rocket scientist (literally) at an aerospace company in California. He swing dances for fun.
…and THAT makes him the most hardcore SOB I’ve ever met.
jives with Gavin McInnes advice to never be nice to junkies. Tough love or nothing
Life will whisper, then it will speak up, then it will kick your ass like a red-headed step child.
I’d had a few [wake up calls]. I just kept hitting the snooze button.
NICE.
Excellent metaphor! Perfect way to express an abusive relationship, to the many people who naively demand an explanation.
“But..why didn’t you just.. leave?”
Those images are pretty haunting, especially the metal plate on the throat and the mask. Not sure if it’s an O₂ mask or another metal plate for jaw immobilization, but I guess it doesn’t matter. Haunting.
@Sam: Lost a friend and colleague last Summer who got rear ended on his bike by a drunk driver at a stoplight. No helmet, massive head trauma (no helmet). I see folks here in TX riding all the time w/no helmet and can’t fathom the thinking behind it. But, I don’t ride, either, so there’s probably a disconnect there.
in august of 2001 a drunk driver damn near ended my love of riding bikes and my life all in one go..idiot cut in front of me on hwy 6 and 45 south and i rear ended him at about 60 or so..spent the next 18 months in a body cast from toes to my belly button. luckily i had my gear on..i spent the next year after that learning to walk, use the bathroom and everything..I still have issues from that..As much as id love to get back on a bike, i will admit i’m scared to