It's Just A Collarbone.
27 Mar 2014
By Natty G.
JUST a Collarbone . . . shake it off and keep riding wuss!!!!!
Oct 18th 2009 was a nice day. My wife Fawn, Trey, and Nat and I were out for a typical Capital Forest (Olympia, Washington) ride when a sasquatch, or a cougar, or maybe a bear reached out and knocked me off my bike. For that is the only explanation that makes any sense as to why I ate major shit on a trail I had ridden dozens of times before!
I am missing 5-10 seconds of space-time from that particular moment in my mountain biking life. The second to last thing I remember is riding a very easy, very straight, very smooth section of the trail called Green Line 6. The last thing I remember was pulling my sorry ass up off the ground. Moments later Nat rides up and my first question to her is “is my jaw broken”, because the only pain I felt was the right side of my face and neck. Nat’s response, “no, but your right shoulder is F’d up dude!”
Not until I tried to move my arm did the extent of the injury hit me. The grinding noise solidified my thoughts - “hmm, something is broken”. About that time my wife rode up and sprang into action. She is a Physical Therapist Assistance, so she isolated my right arm in a make shift sling and off we headed to the truck, which thankfully was only ½ mile away. Notice that Trey was nowhere around, he was way in front of me as usual and blissfully waiting at the car. Nat helped to push my bike off the trail to my truck while Fawn and I headed to the emergency room.
I have heard that a collarbone break is a painful experience, however, I felt none . . . until we had to drive out of Capital Forest on bumpy as shit roads. Then the muscle spasms started. About every 30-40 seconds a very intense spasm would hit where the bone was trying like hell to break the skin. Picture a sharp pencil-looking bone shard working it’s way up through the surface.
A couple days later, I had surgery on my shredded collarbone. I remember seeing my wife and Nat in the OR prep room (Nat worked at the hospital at the time) – but I don’t remember much of the conversation due to AWESOME drugs. But, they both said I was a blabbing idiot.
4 ½ years later, I have about 90% normal strength/range and it did take about 6 months of riding to get the negative thoughts out my head. But, now I feel like I am riding much better and with more confidence. Countless riders have this same injury and countless more will . . . so shake it off wuss and keep riding – after 6-8 weeks in a sling of course.
Shred on my friends and watch out for the squatches!
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