Patron Saint of Broken Bones

My Dad's sister arrived from New Jersey earlier this afternoon. Mary Ann gets here tomorrow with my cousin Sam. We all haven't been together in the same room for years so I'm really looking forward to it.

Aunt Kathy gave me this necklace of Saint Stanislaus Kostka, the patron saint of broken bones. The only jewelry I wear is my wedding ring, but now I feel like it's in my best medical interest to wear this necklace for the rest of my life. I could have used this six months ago, but then I probably would have had some type of other massive injury that didn't affect my bones. Instead, I could have injured my guns, Lightning and Thunder, my notorious fists, Law and Order, or my lesser known but equally defining love handles, John Candy and Chris Farley.

Pain control is still going well, which has allowed me to be more mobile than we anticipated. The only exception occurred last night. I had a very bad muscle twitch in my right foot that caused me to slam the gas pedal to the floor. Obviously, my foot didn't move, but my pain level went instantly from nothing to an 8. It scared me more than anything else, but it also worried me that there would be more episodes. Fortunately we have Valium to help us fight this problem. I haven't tried to do 80MPH since last night.

I'm still getting used to the external fixator. It's hard to believe I'm going to be wearing this thing for three months. I'll go ahead and say it, you're lucky I'm not crutching around in this thing without pants.

My first attempt to put on boxers and shorts took place as I was checking out of the hospital yesterday. Imagine owning a giant TV satellite dish. Now, replace your right foot with this satellite dish. Need to put on a pair of boxers and shorts? Hope you've got four hours to spare, because you are in store for adventure staring Frustration and Anger. If you don't have any elastic bands in the waist, then give up and start crying. But if you do have the latest in waist expansion technology, then your odds of being clothed like a decent person have just increased -- but you're not out of the woods yet.

In addition to industrial strength width and girth, a satellite TV dish wearer also must deal with numerous sharp edges and pointy metal objects. It's Velcro, only it's made of metal and it can kill you.

When crutching around the apartment, most of the furniture and small animals near your external fixator are at constant risk of injury. I've slammed my exoskeleton ankle against the toilet, the bathtub, the couch, my left leg (repeatedly), the dog, my wife -- everything. It's a wrecking ball of death. Look out, Spunky!

The hematoma is growing at an amazing rate. I put a nickel up against Chris Farley to help you gain some perspective of the massive size of this sea of blood under my skin. Earlier today, Brooke came in for a hug and elbowed me right in the bruise. I over reacted to get some extra sympathy. Don't tell Brooke, though (she stopped reading the blog months ago since she's living it every day).

Oddly enough, my backside has yet to go viral. Not sure what the hold up is.

It was a nice enough night outside that Brooke and I decided to go hang out on our third floor terrace for a few minutes. It's become one of our traditions that anytime I break my ankle, we spend some time out here on my wheel chair.

At first glance, it would appear from this picture that I'm not in a lot of pain and that Brooke is not extremely stressed out from a three day long hospital stay in Virginia. It's because it's been heavily Photoshopped.