Don’t Harsh on My Thrill-Seeking Buzz But Keep Me Safe on the Slopes – Part 3

A  life-changing skiing hit and run made me think – how could we change safety conditions on mountains without messing with what we advanced skiers treasure most? Here’s part 3 of 3 of my blog. Thanks for reading!

In my previous blog post I shared advocacy measures to make beginner slopes safer and reduce skiing hit and runs. My words may sound heretical to many snow sport diehards, the ski free or die defenders of the right to a deregulated mountain experience. Mountains will surely raise their hackles too. But let me share a bit more about my experience to consider the cost of change I’m suggesting in comparison to the depth and breadth of loss individuals like me can experience in the current environment. 

My first loss was of memory beyond anything trauma-related. While the events in the moments post-impact are still vivid, my memory in the weeks and months afterward is patchy. I know that the little girl’s father, who was skiing close behind us, must have retrieved her. I remember snow pelting my face as I experienced my first ski patrol toboggan ride down the mountain. Having grown up in rural New Hampshire and raised by a doctor, I refused transport to the local hospital where I suspected they had limited capabilities to deal with a major accident. So instead, I had ski patrol pack me into the back of our SUV, legs propped up by scratchy emergency blankets, my husband and son in front plugging in Google Maps coordinates to a major hospital in Hudson County, New Jersey where we live. I was forever in the ER, mostly sitting and waiting, and from time to time rolled onto cold tables to have them take X-Rays, MRIs, and, for some reason my insurance company disputed and the hospital couldn’t retrospectively explain, a CAT scan. Hours later at home, I began my three month vigil on the couch in our living room because my husband couldn’t carry me safely to our bedroom upstairs. 

I don’t remember being given a diagnosis about my obvious right leg injury even though the medical record of my visit with my surgeon three days after my accident says we talked about it. My surgeon was amazing by the way. I don’t doubt he told me the details of my injury and the procedure he’d undertake to put me back together, including all the risks associated with it, which, as a person weighing just north of a hundred pounds but who metabolizes anesthesia like a sumo wrestler, makes me a challenge to be kept under without overdosing. But I don’t remember our conversation. All I remember is that when he looked at my knees and saw my right one was three times the size of my left, he grabbed a gigantic syringe, said “you’re tough, right?” and stuck it into my swollen knee, draining more than a cup of bloody pus. That’s the first time I felt real pain. I mean the kind that makes you want to scream, or punch someone in the face, or stab another part of your body to dissipate it. Luckily I didn’t do any of that. Although I’m pretty sure I said something snarky to my husband like, “turn away, you’re not the patient!” because he sometimes faints at the sight of blood.  

My next memory was finding out on my way to my surgery for my right tibia that my left tibia was also broken. I was on my phone in the back of our car, paying the thousands of balance already due (that’s a whole other article), when my most recent MRI test results popped up. Dr. J confirmed my injury right before I went in, while I was signing all the forms that basically say if you die due to the procedure or complications afterward, ah well, that’s your problem. Up until that point my right leg was obviously messed up, but now I had to stay off my left leg too. A wheelchair would be my safest option, with crutches reserved for parts of my house, like my bathroom, that were not accessible. 

During the weeks following my accident, I have little memory beyond my unfolding trauma, which contributed to my second loss: of time and connection with my family. My son who was twelve at the time would rush by the couch where I lay on the way to and from school or music lessons or hockey practice and I know we must have talked, but now all I remember is wanting our exchanges to be more than, “hi” and “how are you?” I could see he didn’t want to linger and I didn’t really want him to see me in pain, lying on my back in a gigantic brace from my hip to my ankles. I know my husband fed me and checked in on me, and held my hand sometimes at night while watching the Crown or Downtown Abbey. Those were the only plotlines I could handle because they were so far removed from my life that it didn’t hurt my heart to watch them. 

My husband tried to include me. He carted me around to various events in my wheelchair, including an ice hockey tournament, which Dr. J cleared me to attend because my son’s team made it to the state championships. Transporting my body became a neighborhood production, with my husband and a friend four doors down carrying me in and out of the house on our slippery February front stairs. Our tight-knit hockey family tried to include me too, but mainly I remember feeling so far away from people because my emotional bandwidth was spent on trying to make it through. That and I could barely see above the rink boards in my wheelchair. There were so many days where all I remember are the logistics of managing a broken body, trying to figure out how not to fall while going to the bathroom by myself at night. 

For the first three months before I was able to walk, I felt strangely exposed and invisible at the same time. Mostly, I was alone at home on the couch. Those few times I was in public, people either looked at me with pity or completely didn’t see me. Some even got annoyed when I couldn’t maneuver fast enough out of their way. No doubt this gave me greater appreciation for the lived experience of people with accessibility issues, and for that I am grateful. Everyday activities I’ve taken for granted, from using a public toilet, to opening a door, or getting on an elevator, became hills to climb. I often needed help and hated not being able to navigate the world independently. The worst was feeling reduced to other peoples’ perceived sense of your incapacity. That’s completely dehumanizing. 

I’m lucky that I can now walk. I have back most of my range of motion in my knees. But this wasn’t without significant pain and sacrifice. People cringe when I describe my injuries but they hurt far less than the physical therapy I undertook daily for the first six months of my accident. Even now, I have to be conscious of stretching, strength training, and not sitting still too long because everything stiffens and starts to hurt. That makes sleep hard: I wake up at least two or three times a night due to pain. For those who haven’t experienced scar tissue, it’s not for the faint of heart. The problem with the double whammy of broken bones and soft tissue damage is that recovery from these injuries is juxtaposed. Bones need to stay still while ligaments must move to heal. Thank goodness I ended up with an excellent physical therapist who didn’t set limits based on my chart age. Without that, combined with years of sports training, I wouldn’t have had the wherewithal to fight for my old life back.

I’m also lucky I’m terrified of drugs. It’s a control thing, really. I like to be in charge of my high, which is why sports have always been my jam. But this experience almost caused me to lose myself to opioids. I remember the moment I decided to stop numbing myself on Tramadol, which, despite being told it’s not really an opioid, well, yep it is. I was only taking the very lowest dose at night, but I would crave it, counting down minutes until five o’clock at night, when heel pain, like someone was sticking prickly hot needles into the back of my feet, became overwhelming. Interestingly, Tramadol didn’t make me stop hurting. It just made me stop caring about, well, anything. 

Yes, I experienced multiple losses and indignities.. My family has pretty decent health insurance, but my husband and I are self-employed. That means we have always opted for a higher deductible so we can afford our monthly care insurance premiums, which, even so, add up to about $30,000 a year. Between medical bills and uncovered physical therapy and acupuncture-related expenses for pain management and treatment to improve mobility and break down scar tissue, my injuries racked up about $10,000. Add onto that lost wages due to injury and that’s about another $15,000, even though I worked the day of my surgery and then started up again about a week afterward. I took meetings with clients off camera because when I saw myself on zoom I looked discombobulated, hair matted from hours of lying on my back, clothes wrinkled, face faded because I’d knocked the eyebrow pencil off my makeshift bedside table beside the couch and I couldn’t reach it without hurting myself. I couldn’t dress myself or reach the counters in my kitchen or the shelves inside my refrigerator from my wheelchair to feed myself. My twelve-year old son had to help me change my bandages (remember my husband and sight of blood). Once, my son had to save me when the toilet clogged, plunging my number two when I was stranded in the bathroom, terrified as water overflowed, making the floor tiles like an ice rink. 

In case you’re wondering, you wouldn’t know by looking at me that anything happened. I can walk, even wog (translation: walk/jog), although I have to repeat the mantra “pain is a construct” while my knees scream “why?!” I can’t kneel or crouch because my right knee simply doesn’t bend beyond a certain point without the pain becoming unbearable. 

I’m just now coming to terms with my biggest loss: that my legs will never move the same. Although I’m doing things that make it seem like I’m all better, including believe it or not, skiing again. On February 23, 2023, after more than a year of recovery and with the aid of Stoko K1s (basically leggings with built in medical grade technology that braces your knees), I did five runs at another mountain, and then decided not to push my luck. My knees felt sore for days, but it was totally worth it. Non-skiers think I’m nuts. They can’t understand why I’d put myself at risk, to which I reply, “if you got into a car accident, would you never drive again?” That’s my canned response, with the real one more difficult to say out loud: skiing is one of my true loves. I love everything about skiing, from the time spent stuck on chairlifts with family and friends witnessing landscapes that take your breath away, to the Zen-like rhythm of well-executed turns, and knowing the burgers and fries will taste soggy and rubber-like but I’ll eat them anyway because, well, I always have. I’m not ready to give all this up.

My loss can’t be paid back, but it has inspired me to share my story. I’m not trying to portray myself as a victim. I’ve taken back control of my life. But it has come at a very high cost. Well beyond mountains taking a few measures that could prevent these types of accidents from happening in the first place.