I learned from that ...

[ricki]

Almost stuck this into the Ripping Loose Forum but figured might as well park it here as it bears on kiting as well.

I was out skiing a few years back, going a whopping 4 to 5 mph I think when I felt something hit my calf from the snow and heard a pop. Then came some pretty exquisite pain. I had no idea what was wrong but felt I could hang in there long enough to make it down the hills and into town to go to the hospital. I was in Blue Sky and town was about five miles away but haven't always made the most intelligent decisions. This was one of them. Instead of toughing it out, pain and all I should have called up the ski patrol for a sled ride to the base and care. The reason why comes up shortly. Anything that put the leg in tension was excruciating but I slowly made my way to the base bumps and all anyway. Then brilliantly elected to limp about a half mile to the hospital. Long story short I tore my gastroc in the left calf. Painful but not totally disabling, that is unless the Achilles just below gets too messed up as a result. It took about 8 months for it to heal and both the left and right gastrocs have been torn again as a result in part. Generally, reinjury has been related to kiting ironically enough after skiing.

Moral: If you hurt yourself sometimes staying immobile and securing help and in my case transportation can be the smart move even if you "can handle it." Sometimes all that pain is trying to tell you something that you should listen to instead of trying to ignore. Sometimes being a man (or woman) about it is just being stupid, as in my case. This may also include not "working out the pain" in some cases too depending upon the injury. Why? Because you might save yourself way longer than necessary rehab and risk of repeated injury. Almost three years later, rehab and hassles and it still isn't quite right and has to be babied and carefully warmed up and down. Live and learn.

Be sure to warm up and warm down btw. Takes time but well worth it, believe me.

[ricki]

Something else I learned during the visit to the ER of the hospital. In the thinly curtained bed next to mine was an 18 year old guy with a fractured neck. I recall he fractured C5, C7 (?) and herniated a disk. Laying around for about 4 hours allowed me to learn a lot about what this young fellow experienced and what he had to look forward to. He was in a skiing competition and had just jumped off a cornice and promptly slammed in hard, burying himself almost up to his waist head first. As young as he was he was a trained ski patroller. He felt some tingling in his fingers which he didn't think was right. Despite the pain, disorientation and being submerged in snow he elected not to move. This one act was credited by the doctors, at least three of them at different times that I overheard, for sparing him likely paralysis. I understood as of that moment that no serious nerve impairment had been detected much less paralysis.

Moral: If you hit hard and suspect serious injury perhaps along your spinal column, don't move. Easier said than done right? Still, if you think about it in advance you might have a better shot at actually doing this. I can think of some kiteboarding injuries where the kiter got up and tried to walk it off likely resulting in some nerve impairment and paralysis. If you attend a kiter that took a good hit against something hard, you might do them a favor by helping them stay quite and motionless until help arrives. I heard a story a couple of weeks ago about a windsurfer that suffered a neck fracture hitting his board. A doctor/windsurfer/kitesurfer came up to help and worked to hold the guys head motionless in the water for about 20 minutes until help arrived. Not easy but movement can really alter your prospects in the future. Good stuff to think about just in case something like this happens.