The Injury

I've replayed the event in my head hundreds of times since it happened. I'm in the end zone, running to my left. The disc is thrown behind me, so in an attempt to make a play, I plant on my left leg to jump backward and grab the disc. My foot sticks in the ground, my knee twists, I feel some popping. The next thing I know I'm on the ground holding my knee, in the most pain I had ever been in. I knew instantly that it was dislocated. As the trainer, Ken, eased my hands off my leg and slowly straightened it out, I felt a couple thunks as it popped back in place. Ken proceeded to ask me a couple questions, seeing if I could feel certain pokes and prods, wondering if I could kick against his hand, wondering if I could put any weight on it. I had full feeling, but that was about it. They carried me off the field and loaded me into my dad's rental van and we set off to the hospital.

Fuck.

Things have been flying by since then. I decided it was in my best interest to skip out on the team spring break trip and instead fly back to Pittsburgh. Flying cross-country with a bum leg that I can't really move or bend without using my arms sure makes it tough to fit on a plane. I sat in an aisle seat so that I could stick my leg out, but I was afraid that someone would trip over me at some point so I managed to swing my leg under the seat in front of me. Six hours of flights and one aggressively cramped leg later, I landed in Pittsburgh at 9:00am Monday morning, where my mom picked me up. We headed home, ate some food, decompressed as much as I could, and then started calling doctors' offices to schedule an appointment as soon as possible. We managed to get one scheduled the same day at 2:00pm. The doc took some x-rays, poked and prodded some, and told me an MRI was definitely needed. No shit. I scheduled the appointment on the drive home for the following morning.

As my mom had to head to work, I recruited Cyd to help get me to Presby for my appointment. After she drove me there, I headed in and was quickly taken back to change for the MRI. Oh yeah, changing is really hard. Again, I can't really bend or move my leg, so taking off and putting on pants takes a lot of effort. The MRI operator found me sitting on the floor of the changing room slowly sliding the hospital pants on. He sat me down in a wheelchair and shuttled me off to the MRI. 30 minutes of laying motionless and its over. The operator tells me the doctor should receive the images later that afternoon so I could schedule the follow-up appointment for the following day. Cyd picks me back up and we head to her house to laze around. I schedule the appointment at there for noon on Wednesday.

At around 2:00pm Cyd drives me back to my mom's house where I start watching some of the Ultiworld filmed games from Stanford, because what else do I have to do? Halfway through watching the UNC vs. Oregon semi-finals game, I get a call from the doctor who is looking at my MRI results. He proceeds to tell me what I already basically knew. Everything is fucked. A torn ACL, a sprained PCL, a partially torn MCL, a complex tear in the medial meniscus, and a partial tear in the lateral meniscus. I don't even know what half of that shit is. He says I don't need the follow-up appointment on Wednesday, and instead says I'll be scheduled for an appointment with a surgeon on Thursday.

At the time of the call it had been a little over 72 hours since the injury. I had been so excited for Stanford. My 2nd year on the team, the first year as a starter. An O-line starter, at that. I played a whopping 2 points before it happened. The score was 2-3 in the first fucking game of the day. Now it'll be in the range of a year before I can get back on the field.

So now I'm just sitting here, leg elevated so that my knee is above my heart, wondering when the surgery will be. How much school will I miss? How am I going to get to class? When will I be able to walk?

I like to think I've been handling this pretty well. I had plenty of time to wallow during my flights back to Pittsburgh, and at this point I think I'm over the fact that I'm not going to be able to play this college or club season. Honestly, I'm a little surprised I'm not more upset. Anybody that knows me knows that ultimate is basically all I do outside of school. I guess it's still going to be all I do but in a much different capacity. I'll be taking on some sort of coaching role for Pitt, and we'll see what I do for the club season. I still plan on getting to the gym once I can physically get myself there and lifting what I can.

But for now I'll just be taking it day by day. Figuring out which of the hundred different positions I've tried putting my leg in is the most comfortable (none of them are). Hopefully the surgery is scheduled soon so that I can get on to the road to recovery as soon as possible.

Onwards.