My Motorcycle Injuries

The Move I walk amidst the present circumstance At times to search, at times to plainly see And though I strive to reach beyond this trance The whole remains as a dim memory   I’ll go, I know, to times as yet unseen It’s there that fate upholds my hidden vein Though deeper still lies every lasting mean The past is just a thing that must remain                                                                                                 -Lazarus

I’ve been at it again. We’ve been doing some home improvement projects to get our house in better shape. I had to bring everything of this nature to an abrupt halt four years ago when I wrecked my bike and pretty much wrecked my body with it. My wife and I had plans, but they all fell by the wayside as we focused on getting my body to recover. We have started to get several projects going on the house, with some things handled by hired professionals and other things handled by me. I have spent the past week working on things such as the installation of an outside door with a new frame, tons of landscaping, installing outdoor lights, and a bunch of other things that I won’t bore you with. In the end, I’m just sort of wiped out physically. Between the repairs and running several errands, my body has been fighting back in a harsh way. My wife has wanted these things done, and I have a hard time saying “no”. I always feel that she should have better things in this world than a guy who just...

So yeah, I’ve mentioned in the past my inability to sleep properly since the accident. It was getting better a few months ago, but things have regressed a bit. It’s currently Tuesday morning around eleven. Last night I went to bed at 11:30 and I woke up around 3:00. I couldn’t get back to sleep, so after laying there for about 45 minutes I got up and did some work. I usually have something that I can be doing and it wasn’t hard to get things started for the day. I honestly don’t go to bed thinking about problems or unfinished business, but I wake up far too soon and can’t seem to get back to sleep. It was a bit worse the first couple of years after I came home from the hospital. I would lie down in bed for the night and remain awake for hours. I would then finally fall asleep and wake up within an hour or two. Over the years my sleep patterns have fluctuated, but the actual time spent asleep has remained pretty grim. However, the past few months have been different. I’ve been able to f...

This past week I held a funeral service for someone who was associated with the church that I pastor. She wasn’t a member, but she and her husband would visit in a worship service once a year or so. She was a very nice person and had fought a disease bravely for many years. Her husband asked if I would be willing to have the memorial service in our church auditorium, along with a time of fellowship with family and friends afterward in our dining hall. It seems like a strange statement to make as I prepare to type it, but the truth is that funeral services involve a lot of work. Family members have to put forth a great deal of thought and effort in order to plan and implement every detail involved. As a pastor I always attempt to accommodate every need according to the things that family members express. In this case, there was a need to prepare the church auditorium (usually easier to achieve, but we were trying to get things ready for Easter Sunday services this week). Also, there was...

The past couple of weeks have been a little more rough for me. Things have gone great personally in several areas of my life and I can hardly count the blessings, but my body has been  (warning: bad pun ahead)  a bit of a pain. It becomes a source of frustration because I will go through periods of time where everything is still a mess, but generally OK. My body has experienced some permanent damage as a result of the motorcycle accident, but at times it seems negligible for the most part within any given day. I often experience a comparatively minimal amount of pain and hindrance. Within the past week or two, however, not so much. A few days ago I actually had to use a hand brace for two days because of the pain in my wrist. The nerve damage done to my hand and wrist leaves me with discomfort and/or pain at all times, but the pain experienced a few days ago went beyond the usual stuff. I woke up in the night and couldn’t get back to sleep because of the pain in my wrist....

One aspect of my motorcycle accident that I never really talk about involves money. My lawyer initially said that my case had the potential for a substantial payout. The other driver was completely at fault, she had insurance, and I had a multitude of injuries. Several of those injuries involve lifelong complications and care. I pay monthly for doctor visits and medicines that are all directly related to injuries sustained through the accident, and I have been told that I will require further surgery in the future. Financial compensation time right? Wrong. I had medical bills from the initial care that made the available insurance coverage amounts seem like pennies in a jar. The problem was twofold: (1) The insurance companies granted payments that included the maximum amount of coverage for which they had agreed to pay within the policies. They did not hesitate at all to pay the full amounts, but their “good faith” payments involved everything for which they had contracted to pay. As ...

I have done a lot of walking over the years since the accident. It started in physical therapy and continued at home after my therapy ended. I still do a lot of the things that they had me doing in therapy and I find that it all helps me to use the various muscles in my legs. The first thing that they had me doing involved walking sideways, but doing so between the parallel bars for safety. I still walk sideways for a certain distance daily and I feel that I still benefit from it. I also walk backwards quite a bit and that also seems to work on different muscles in my leg. Additionally, I walk for a certain distance doing leg lifts with each step, and I also “trot” for roughly 300 steps daily. I can’t really run, but I can trot fast enough to escape slow moving zombie hordes, should the need ever arise. I wear a Fitbit device to log my steps in order to make sure that I’m covering the necessary distance each day. I sometimes don’t wear it for weeks at a time because I’m fairly consiste...