People do come into our lives for a reason! I had the honor to run with Kris at the Road to Hope half marathon in 2011. I could hear Kris’s steps , making our way finish line. They were steps of power, strength and determination!!!!!!
Here is why:
I have been training for the 2011 Road to Hope half marathon in Hamilton, Ontario for 485 days. “Why so long?” you ask. Well, I know we all have our own things going on and our own stories, but here is mine.
By mid-morning on July 9, 2010, it was already hot and the air was so thick you could take a bite out of it in the south west corner of Pennsylvania. I was rock climbing there, or at least I was until I fell. Five hours later I was lying in a hospital bed in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania begging my surgeon to save my leg.
“I AM A RUNNER! I AM A TRIATHLETE! I NEED MY LEG!” The trauma surgeon, Dr. Peter Siska, tried to reassure me that he understood because he was a runner too.
Perhaps it was the morphine, but I was convinced he did not understand. I kept repeating how I had races to run, triathlons to complete, that my first half Ironman triathlon was only a couple of months away.
Dr. Siska said the devastating words, “Your season is over.” I felt immediately defeated. He continued, “Your leg is dying. You shattered both the tibia and fibula. The break is one of the worst I have seen. The pressure from the bleeding inside your leg is strangling the life out of it.” And when I thought it couldn’t get any worse he told me that I needed to prepare myself for waking up from surgery without my leg below the knee.
My emotions raged for the next thirty minutes. I cried. I got angry. And then I was calm. I could run with a prosthetic. I remembered reading an article on Oscar Pistorius, a double-amputee sprinter. I had even participated in triathlons against participants with prosthetic limbs. “If they can do it, so can I,” was all I could think. I may lose my leg, but I was not about to lose my spirit and my drive. I can do this, I thought.
I will tell you now, I had a favorable outcome. Three surgeries totaling over 10 hours, a plate and nine screws, and an orthopedic surgeon who reconstructed my leg twice because he was not satisfied with the result of his initial attempt (he told me I would have had a crooked leg and my runs would have been no more).
Over a year later, I struggle to find the words to tell others of my journey. It has been a long road to recovery, and quite frankly I am not 100% yet. I still have a lot of work to do, but I have learned so much that had I not fallen, I may never have experienced.
I am a girl constantly on the go and this put the brakes on my life as I knew it. I couldn’t do anything on my own. I couldn’t work, I couldn’t bathe myself, I couldn’t help with household chores, I couldn’t drive and worst of all I couldn’t train. The only thing I could do was lie on the couch and obsess about not training. This was a drastic change in my life and it was difficult to deal with at times. But many people rallied to help me overcome my injury and all the difficulties that came with recovery.
The week I came home from the hospital, I was working out in my wheelchair with my friends. A workout was designed for me. I would wheel my wheel chair as fast I could for my heart. I did an upper body routine for my arms, abs and back. I did calf raises with my “good” leg.
I could do this with the promise that I would not overdo it. Whatever that means. I cried often, I wanted to be running with my friends, walking lunges, jump squats, push-ups and all the rest.
I had visitors that first month while I was on the couch, almost daily. Luckily for my bank account this kept me from overspending with online shopping.
When I was cleared to work, my co-workers organized a rotating “take Kris to work and home” schedule. This was no small task, as it required the driver to deal with my wheelchair, coffee, computer bag, lunch bag, and my crutches. When I began physical therapy, my co-workers dropped me off and my fiancé would pick me up.
Developing a routine helped distract my obsession with my softening body. I had not completed a full work out in six weeks.
I celebrated almost daily at the beginning. I celebrated everything. I celebrated being able to shave my leg, moving my big toe, when I started weight bearing, when I didn’t have to use my wheelchair anymore, when I ditched a crutch, when both crutches were gone, when I put TWO shoes on, and when I was able to drive again. FREEDOM!! The day my physical therapist told me I was allowed to swim at the gym, you would have thought I won the lottery, and I HATE swimming.
I went to physical therapy 2-3 times a week, and as a result I was a month ahead of what the doctors told me, which was glorious. As my recovery became more difficult and my expectations grew, the celebrations came farther apart and the depression came more often.
I had to learn to walk all over again. This was frustrating to say the least. It hurt to walk, I walked with a significant limp, and my leg was still swollen to twice its normal size. And it just didn’t seem to be getting any better. My shoes didn’t fit on that foot. The mobility in my ankle wasn’t progressing like I wanted or needed. Meeting my goal of running by May was beginning to be a pipe dream.
I was frustrated all the time, but whether it was at physical therapy or working out with my friends, I repeated to myself over and over again, “Remember why you are doing this, remember why this is important to you, and remember why you want this. You can do this. You will do this. This is temporary.” And I continued to push. And push. And push. I began to see that my leg wasn’t holding me back, it was actually opening doors that were closed or weren’t there before.
Soon enough I was allowed to jog for one minute on the treadmill. I cried that day. Then it was two minutes. I cried twice as much that day. And before I knew it, eight months after my accident, I ran/walked in the local St. Patrick’s Day 4 miler in Dublin, Ohio. I ran two and walked two miles. I cried a lot that day too.
Two months later I ran my first 5k without walking at all, and then in August (one year and one month after my accident) completed my “comeback” triathlon in Columbus, Ohio with my two physical therapists by my side, I wasn’t the only one crying that day.
The next step of my recovery would be a huge leap. The Road to Hope Half Marathon, which I did with Coach Nancy. Each step I took, I took for all the days I struggled. Each mile I ran was for everyone who supported me, celebrated each milestone with me, and trained with me.
Race day was beautiful! The sun was shining down on us, the energy was positive. I beat my goal time, and I beat the odds that were placed on me back in July 2010. I was back!
I had never been put in a situation where my physical activity was taken away, and the threat of never being able to do what I once could was staring me down every day. But I fought harder and harder, and along the way I learned to overcome and celebrate.
It wasn’t easy, but the entire journey was completely worth it. I am often asked, if I could change history and never had had the accident, would I. And I have to say, although I would love my leg to look like the other, everything that I experienced after the accident, changed me.
The people who have come into my life as a result have impacted me. The overall generosity I experienced is indescribable and I am forever grateful to those who supported me and celebrated with me each and every step of the way.
As a result of the accident, the journey to recovery has taught me to be patient with myself, to trust myself, and to accept that I cannot change or control everything (although I have to be honest, this is really hard). I learned how to let others help me. I started to see things through a new set of eyes and realize that I hold the power to change pretty much anything I set out to. I began to focus more on what is really important in life and less on the trivial. I learned that we can plan all we want, but life has twists and turns and you can be left behind or you can create your own destiny. But most of all, I learned to believe in myself. I learned anything is possible, it just depends on how much I want it.
( Kris with Coach Nancy finish line 21km Road to Hope November 2011)
