It’s been four weeks today since the crash and my shoulder is making real progress. I am spending most of my time out of the sling, even slept last night without it on. I’m no longer taking any pain medication and I’m sleeping fairly well now.

I can lift my arm to the side up to the level of my shoulder without pain, and not quite that far to the front. I’m still getting used to the big bump on top where my collar bone sticks up. Even with surgery I would still have this bump.

I have to confess, I’m pretty upset to have my shoulder disfigured. I’ve been a weightlifter for about 16 years now (yikes!) and have lifted some damn heavy weights to get these shoulders to be strong. They’re going to be strong again, but the right one is always going to look whacked. Oh well, at least I have a good story!

What am I doing to stay in shape so Dave doesn’t whup-up on me on our next tour? I’m hiking every other day or so, and on the days I don’t I head to the gym to do an hour of hard intervals on the stationary bike, a couple rounds on the indoor track of walking lunges, and such things as I can do without using my bad shoulder. That’s pretty darn limiting. I can see the free weight area from where I sit on the bike. I see all the things I can’t do right now: pull ups, bench press, military press, squats and such. All require two working shoulders. But I’ll have both back in action soon, though when they are it’s time to take off on a new adventure.

Dave and I think it’s best to save Africa for next fall through the following spring so we have plenty of time for the whole route we initially intended. As I wrote earlier, it’s looking like we may be doing a sea kayak tour next summer. We just need to fill in a plan for January through spring, assuming I can ride a loaded touring bike starting in mid-January, which I think is reasonable.

The latest idea taking shape is a bike tour through Southeast Asia, heading South to North to work with the heat in the best way possible. That area has definitely been on my wish list for a bike tour, and I think the heat is better than cold for a shoulder still in the healing process. (I hope to be strong enough to ride, but also know that full recovery can take many months.) Also, we can plan a route that would leave plenty of spare time for hiking and laying on warm beaches so I don’t overdo it with my shoulder.

It’s sounding great to me right now, as Golden is covered in a thin blanket of snow and we’re expecting the coldest night so far.

I felt great yesterday, and since it has been just over three weeks since the injury it seemed about time to start doing a bit more. I’ve already been taking off the sling for a couple hours a day to let my muscles stretch and relax a bit. Yesterday was warm and sunny, and since today was supposed to be snowy, I thought I should get outside. I hiked for two and a half hours. Three times I hugged my arm (in the sling) close and jogged a bit. It felt fine. The rest of the day I walked around without the sling. In the evening it felt so good I tested how far I could lift it in each direction. I did a few other things throughout the day, like putting my hair up for the first time on my own. I felt great going to bed. But I woke up this morning in pain and realized it was all too much, too soon.

I’m anxious to do more, to feel better, and to get this arm back in action so I can ride. But I have to pace myself and not get too hasty. I know what I need to do, but it’s so hard to be patient–especially when it feels so good all day.

Baby steps. That’s what I need.

So tonight I’ll take a pain pill and try to sleep well, and tomorrow I get to start over. I’ll wear the sling most of the day, and each day I’ll take it off a little longer. Next week I’ll start the real stretching and basic rehab exercises.

We’ve settled in at Dave’s parents’ house in Golden. His parents drove down from their Wisconsin home with Dave’s grandmother and we’re all here enjoying watching autumn blow in. I’ve had my right arm in a sling for two and a half weeks, so I’ve got a couple more weeks to go. Typing takes quite a bit longer with just my left hand, but I’ve gotten some work done on the back end of the website and have more in the works.

While Dave heads out for bike rides in the foothills surrounding the development, I’ve been on some good little hikes, though after a couple of hours my shoulder hurts pretty good from the jostling. I’ve also found a real gem in the Golden community center in town, as they’ve recently added on a huge new gym with all the fixins for a good workout as well as machines for rehabbing my shoulder. For now I’m doing intervals on the recumbent bike, but I look forward to doing more once I get out of this sling.

Current ideas in the works for upcoming adventures include a shortened version of our West Africa bike tour starting after the first of the year, though we’d have to give up some of the route we had wanted to do since we’ll have less time to ride before the heat of summer sends us packing. There’s some talk of an early January hut-to-hut cross country ski trip with some of Dave’s friends if I’m ready. And we’re already looking ahead to next summer and the possibility of joining two friends for a kayak tour around Baranof Island in Alaska. We may also delay our Africa trip to early next fall so we could start in France and bike down through Spain to take a ferry to Morocco and do the entire West Africa route we had planned to be doing now.

So, lots to think about and plan while we’re waiting on my recovery. Anyone have any other ideas for us to consider?

On Friday afternoon, just south of Pie Town, New Mexico, we were flying down a short hill on packed dirt when I saw Dave have a bit of trouble ahead of me. I saw that it was because of a stretch of sand and tried to get ready by leaning back in order to let the front wheel float over it. But it was too deep and I was going too fast to handle it. My front wheel wheel wiggled and then dug in hard, stopping my bike while I went over the handlebars. I landed full on my shoulder, the wind knocked out of me. In a second the wave of pain hit and I knew there had to be something broken.

Dave turned around as soon as he got through, just in time to see me writhing around on my side, crying in shock and pain. He ran back to me and spoke to me calmly as he felt my head, neck and arms. He kept me focused on finding the problem and making good decisions until I finally calmed down and quit getting mad at myself for doing or not doing the wrong or right thing. He was checking for a dislocated shoulder while I was convinced I’d broken my collar bone. I had a good sized lump on my right shoulder where my collar bone was sticking up, and my shoulder would not hold my arm up. Dave made a sling for me and I sat on the side of the dirt road.

We were out in the middle of the high desert South of Pie Town, a town of about 60 people. Dave said he would give the cell phone a try but I had no confidence it would get a signal. It did! Dave called Nita, the woman who had so graciously put us up at her house the night before (a huge supporter of hikers and bikers on the Continental Divide) but we knew she was headed out of town. He left her a message about our situation. Then we decided to call 411 for the number of the Daily Pie where we had a piece of pie the day before. The woman who answered asked some questions, and after a few minutes Dave gets off the phone saying she and her husband would come get us and take us to the hospital. Just like that we had rescuers on the way.

When they arrived we realized it was the same woman who had been so nice the day before when serving us our pie. Vee and her husband John helped Dave put our bikes and stuff in the back of the truck, then Dave and I climbed in the king cab. We chose to go to the ER in Springerville, AZ since it was back in the direction of Flagstaff. John entertained us with stories of hiking and hunting all over the Southwest and before we knew it we were in Springerville. They got me checked in, then took Dave to get settled in a motel before they left. It was an hour and a half drive and they wouldn’t even let Dave buy gas. Talk about trail angels, this town has them! We are so thankful for the help of Vee and John.

Dave returned to the ER in time to see me drugged up. The x-rays showed I had a slightly dislocated and very separated shoulder and they needed to sedate me so they could put the shoulder back in. There’s nothing they could do about the separation so once I was ready to leave they gave us the x-ray and said to see a doctor in a week.

We spent the night in the motel, and in the morning got ahold of our friend Jay who drove 3 hours from Flagstaff to come pick us up. Monday I saw my orthopedic surgeon who confirmed the separation, saying its mostly a type 5 separation, though it can be reduced (squashed back together to look nearly normal) so he didn’t recommend surgery. He said he is pretty confident I can regain good function through physical therapy, and if it doesn’t perform the way I want it to I can always do surgery later. I was happy with this and feel I can do it. I must keep it in a sling for 3-4 weeks and can then start with basic physical therapy and work up from there.

This is, of course, going to delay our trip to Africa. I imagine it will take 8-12 weeks at least to get my strength to a point where I can manage a loaded bike again. In the mean time I’ll keep posting updates to this blog of my progress as well as tidbits of our research and planning for Africa. Dave also has pictures from New Mexico that he’ll get posted to the gallery soon. And I’ll get faster and more skilled with my left hand. I also need to write and post our last two days before the accident. So stay tuned, this is just an interruption, not the end!