Pain. It was all I felt in my entire body when I landed on the ground from falling. I heard a snap on my way down, and when I hit the ground, I knew immediately I had broken my leg. I wanted to scream, to yell for help, but nothing came out. Instead, I looked at my roommate Kayla, who was giggling at me from falling. Seeing the expression in my face, she quickly lost her smile and realized I was not okay. She asked me if I should call an ambulance and I nodded with desperation. Kayla began to yell for help, and I began to lose consciousness. I was in shock.
I recognized people running around trying to help; getting blankets and water and my cell phone. I stupidly wore shorts to a workout themed party that I was on the way to. I regretted that decision as I lay on the freezing ground while the hail continued to pour on me. The ambulance took 30 minutes to arrive, which felt like years to me. Kayla called every 5 minutes asking where they were and the nice lady on the other line assured, that it would just be a few more minutes. (Kayla, if you’re reading this, I don’t know what I would do without you.) I don’t really remember much from those 30 minutes; just people asking what they could do and trying to keep me conscious.
When the ambulance finally pulled up after what felt like a century, I was immediately disappointed to find that it was not a regular ambulance like in the US, it was a freaking van with sirens. I was going to have to ride in a car. I had just broken my leg … where the hell was my stretcher? Where were the hot doctors yelling, “Her BP is dropping!!” Side note: my only medical knowledge is from Grey’s Anatomy, which is probably mostly incorrect.
A paramedic came down and asked me a few questions and told me he was going to have to take my shoes and socks off to look at my leg. I almost threw up at the pain. I had to use my good leg to jump into the passenger seat of the car. Once again, stretcher please?!? Friends were holding my hand and telling me it was going to be okay, but I knew right then and there that it wasn’t. I had a high pain tolerance and broken my right leg before, and this was nothing like that ... something serious had happened to me.
On the way to the hospital, Kayla called my mom to tell her what had happened. The paramedic driving, tried to talk to me but I couldn’t speak. He tried to tell me he didn’t think my bone was broken, instead he thought it was a ligament tearage or something. I almost laughed at him. But I stayed silent and let him tell me his smart medical opinion. In my head, I was thinking, “yeah, well, there’s a reason you’re an ambulance driver.”
When we arrived at the hospital, I had to get into a wheelchair, which was so painful that I was screaming and yelling. Nurses ran out because they thought I was in labor. I think that was the funniest part of this whole thing … I was displaying as much pain as a pregnant lady!!!
I won’t bore you with the medical details. In short, I broke my tibia and fibula bone, (HAHA in your face Mr. ambulance driver!!) and had to get surgery as soon as possible. When the doctor told me all of my options for surgery, i.e., he could put a metal rod or a screw or a plate in, I began to cry hysterically. He awkwardly left the room and let me have some time with my friends. I realized then that this wasn’t just a temporary break that would be healed in a few weeks and then be perfectly fine. It was going to take months and months of therapy until I walked again. I kept repeating that my New Zealand experience was over when I cried. My friends told me it was just a bump in the road and the experience was going to be a different one. I called my mom and cried into the phone that I wanted her here with me and I could almost hear her heart break into two.
I tried my best to make light of the situation. I made friends with the nurses and doctors and made them laugh a lot. The first night, they put me under to snap my leg back in the right position and put a cast on it, and when I woke up, I told the crabby x-ray technician that she needed to get laid. Not my proudest moment.
In total, I was in the hospital for 10 days. I saw heaps and heaps of nurses and doctors who all contemplated the best option for me. I ended up getting a metal rod in the tibia, a plate in my fibula, and two screws in me. Weird, right? I’m a bionic woman. Also, who the hell thought of putting a metal rod in someone to fix their bones?? I would like to speak to them about their sanity.
As of now, I’m trying to be tough with the pain and the inability to walk. It’s hard, but so is life. I had everything planned out for the rest of the semester. I was going to go bungee jumping in Queenstown, and hike Able Tasman, and go sky diving. I had it all prepared and ready, and one hailstorm took that away from me. But, I guess the thing about life is that it never works out the way you think it will. Stay tuned for the next chapter of my walk-less journey through this crazy thing we call life.
