Shattered bones, not dreams

Healthy & happy before the crash

     On July 29, 2012 my husband & I, together with a few friends were on a long training ride. They were training for IMKY & I was training for Augusta 70.3. Stephen & I decided to cut the 100 mile route short & headed towards home while the others continued. We were traveling down CohuttaBeaverdale Rd near Dalton, Ga & were moving at a pretty good clip (40mph). I was riding my Blue TT bike & was mid interval when a dog ran out in front of me. With zero reaction time, I T-boned the big dog & flew over the aero bars.
     What I remember is the pain, fear & screams that came out of me. My head hit first, then my left shoulder & I rolled over into the ditch. Once down, I couldn't move & was scared because the burning pain in my neck was so severe, I had never felt anything so painful. A man came to my side first, then there were 2 & one called 911. My eyes remained closed the entire time and I never saw anyone who helped me. Since Stephen had been riding ahead of me, he did not know I was down. A passerby in a car informed him that his wife was "back there in the ditch" & he came back to help me. The pain in my neck overpowered everything & I could not move my left arm. I was teetering in & out of consciousness, shivering and in shock.
    When EMS arrived, the first thing the paramedic said was "from the look of her knees, this isn't the first time she's fallen off a bike". I remember being offended by that. Really dude? I'm lying hear bleeding to death & you're cracking jokes? In the end though, I am thankful to these paramedics because they got me to the hospital & gave me much needed IV pain meds.
     The dogs (2 dogs together) had run out of an open gate in a fenced in yard. The property owners were out of town, but had painters painting their home & the gates were open. A neighbor commented that the dog owners owned "too many animals". Stephen got the name & # of the dog owners for future reference.
     Once at Erlanger hospital, I received more pain meds, xrays, CT's, blood tests & assessments. I was left to wait the results of the tests on a back board, for 4 hours & in a C collar. We asked a few care givers about the weird puncture wound on my neck, but nobody seemed too concerned about it. I was finally discharged with an RX for pain meds & instructed to follow up with an ortho specialist that week.
It was poor medical care.
       The next day I was able to see a specialist who said I had a compound fracture, the weird puncture wound was where the clavicle had ripped through my muscle & skin. He said that the doctors should have arranged emergency surgery because of the risk of infection. So, he scheduled me for surgery that day. 8 hours later I was waking up in Phase 2, (where I actually work) with a titanium plate & 8 screws in my clavicle. The care I received at Memorial was superb. Everything happens for a reason, I believe that. Not sure what the reason is, but there's got to be one.

     12 days of recovering from surgery finds me here, still healing. The pain is a constant ache. Road rash is still there & will leave permanent scars. The doctor says I can not ride, run or swim & basically can't do anything that requires movement or sweat for another month. As much as this disappoints me, I know how lucky I am to be alive. Though my new ride is trashed, there will always be another bike to ride. My family & friends have been wonderful. Plus, the Olympics have been on & my couch time has had no shortage of entertainment. My face is bruised & head concussed, but thanks to my helmet, Im alive.

     I do hope to be able to run the ING NYC marathon as planned,(I am raising $$ for the Make a Wish Foundation) Link to fundraiser though Im missing out on 7 weeks of key training :(. But the Augusta 70.3 is probably not going to happen. There's always other races to do though, not sweating it. My focus now is on doing everything I can to heal quickly & properly so I can get back to doing the things I love to do.