I walk to the mailbox to pick up the mail. We, my husband and I, live on a "less traveled" residential street that never gets plowed, thus the several inches of ice and snow from a week ago remain. I very carefully start to cross the street. Within seconds, I fall hard on the ice. Although I'm not in pain, I can't get up no matter how hard I try. I am trying desperately to move to the side of the street as I am in the middle and don't really care to be hit by a car, but I can't move. I start yelling or at least I think I am yelling. A car stops and I hear people getting out asking if I'm OK. I reply "no." Neighbors come out. I now have a pillow and a heavy blanket, although the ice under me is so cold. I hear the ambulance coming. What is wrong with me that I can't move? I have no idea. The paramedic asks, "Did you hit your head?" "No," I answer. "Where is your significant other?" I answer, "At church now, but he usually doesn't have his phone turned on when he is there." I hear one of the neighbors calling the church. I'm in the ambulance and now have an IV, but other than that, I seem to be fine except when the ambulance goes over bumps in the road and then pain rears its ugly head somewhere in my pelvis? My right leg? Things become blurry then. My husband is somehow already at the hospital when I get there. I receive an IV pain medication. A doctor tells me I have a displaced hip fracture. Surgery is at 4:00. What time is it now? I don't know. My memory is blank after that until nighttime when the pain becomes intense.
I am miserable, the pain is not under control, and I'm not progressing. But how can I progress when I only have 20 minutes of PT in the morning and then again in the afternoon? My care manager sees me 48 hours after the surgery and asks if I want to consider rehab. Yes, I almost scream. A mere 24 hours later and I am transferred to another Magnet hospital with a 14-bed rehab unit. Within a few hours, I've been medicated appropriately, oriented to the unit, and helped to the bathroom. I breathe deeply; I relax; I am safe; this is where I belong.
I look at my 3-hour therapy schedule for today and start to cry. It was so hard yesterday that I don't want to go back. I really don't think I can do this. What is this, my fourth day of rehab? Memories of my patients with hip fractures from the 1970s and the 1980s float through my mind. Why were we trying to get these patients on a bedpan and not use a commode or walk them to the bathroom? How painful that must have been for these patients. Did I realize that? Was I empathetic? Was I present for these patients? I don't remember.
It seems I cry everyday either to my husband or one of the nurses. Today, it was at the end of one of my PT sessions with my primary PT. Why is this going so slowly? I can hardly lift my leg. I call it my 100-lb leg. The edema in my right foot, leg, and pelvis is unbelievable. My sister has to buy me extra large sweatpants because I can't get into my medium and large ones from home. The morning of the accident, I weighed myself, something I don't often do. I don't like to see the number as it's never as low as I want it to be. Two days after the accident, my bed weight shows I weigh 12 lb more than I had at home, and right now I am feeling every single one of those pounds.
Since the edema is not going down, I have an ultrasound for a possible blood clot in my 100-lb leg. It is negative, but the pain of all of that edema continues. I need pain medication more often than I think I should. But at night, I sleep like a baby for close to 10 hours each night. Oh yes, there are the regular bathroom wake-up calls, which are promptly answered by staff, but I fall right back to sleep each time.
I'm close to discharge. I've passed the critical tests that I've seen my patients go through before discharge. I am ready for home, although I have no idea of what awaits me there. Follow-up appointments have been made with my surgeon, my primary care physician, and physical therapy. My home prescriptions have been ordered. I say goodbye and thanks to dedicated staff who have helped me on my road to recovery.
Most of the recovery of a hip fracture, approximately 90% so they say, takes place in the first 3 months. As I write this editorial, it is a month since my accident. No, I'm not ready to participate in the Olympics, watching them every day as I do, and no, I still need my walker, but there is hope that this too shall pass, and by the time this editorial is published in the May/June issue, I might try the Olympics.
Conflict of Interest
The author declares no conflict of interest.
Pamala D. Larsen
Loveland, CO