From Pickleball to Walker...Who Knew? pt. 2

The video above depicts the end of the hospital/rehab part of the journey. One of the truly strange aspects of this whole trip, was how I became famous as the "pickleball guy". It seemed to start with me in the emergency room, hoping that I had just somehow dislocated some joint in my hip and that somebody would just say "on 3, 1....2...snap!" and I would be just like new. That turned out to not be the case and my newfound friend, Jon, took one look at my foot flopping and shook his head. He told me I was getting the best surgeon around and that he would make sure I'd be back on the court in no time.

It didn't sink in quickly. I'd never spent the night in a hospital before, much less with the CEO of the whole place standing by and telling me stories. He was a neighbor of the folks we were playing pickleball with the day I got injured. Somebody made a call, and man, did I get the red carpet treatment. Jon told me stories about him playing tennis and pickleball and how he was going to be more careful after seeing what happened to me. I remember telling a nurse a few weeks later how cool this guy was, and she replied that she had once spoken to him for 5 minutes and was wowed. Many times during my stay, I wondered how much he had intervened on my behalf. I don't know if I was at the best hospital, but I did know that I was getting the best service that hospital could offer.

Soon, I had x-rays that were shared around as everybody wanted to see how the surgeon had fixed my spiral femur fracture...and they would say in the hallway, "are you the pickleball guy?" One of the head nurses, a petite Filipino woman near my age, always jumped when she saw me. Whipping out her phone and showing me photos of her husband playing league games. "He's rated 4.1!" she exclaimed. I had no idea what that meant, except that I barely knew how to keep score...but they didn't know that. "Yeah, I was a 4.5, the last time I got rated," I replied dryly. Knowing that she was the full-on cartoon version of the Asian mother, I added, "By the way, my blood type is A+!" She looked serious for a moment and then started showing me some more photos of her husband on the traveling circuit of Pickleball pros in Florida. 

Yep, no one was ever going to know that I was a rank beginner that fell over his own feet...the bigger they are the harder they fall...that saying had a brand new meaning to me now...

 

From Pickleball to a walker..who knew

 

 

3 weeks in a hospital...I'm still processing that as I prepare to leave this rehab center where there are two options: get better or go to a nursing home. It's been a huge journey and one that has been full of characters that could have populated a story like the Wizard of Oz.

In a huge bit of irony, a repeating phrase from a seasoned pickleball guy kept coming back to haunt me. It started simply as something fun to do with Taylor while at the gym. We didn't know how to keep score or anything, just having fun beating the ball back and forth, and then we watched other people play and saw how serious they got and the thought started seeping in "hmmm, we could beat those guys.."

One of the senior guys in the group we frequently saw playing, cautioned me that the local emergency rooms were full of injured pickleball players. "Never chase a ball that's past you, never go after a high ball." I basically thought the problem was that really old, decrepit folks were trying to play this simple game.

Then came the day of our first real test as a doubles team, playing against a couple of younger women that were pretty good. Me, as the big guy, I just needed to show that I could return any shot that could come my way. How did I get to this point, I don't know, but I was happy, excited and on fire until the moment I charged the net, missed the ball and crumpled like a rag doll on the ground.

Soon I was surrounded by 3 concerned women and a team of EMTS that decided they might as well bring the hook and ladder truck just in case. I was like "I'll just walk it off" until I saw my foot flopping on the ground and realized that I could not even move an inch without screaming like a little girl.

Soon, I was carried off in an ambulance and began the journey from happy-go-lucky to discovering the true meaning of pain. However, this story is not about pain, surgery and medicine, it is about the parade of characters that filled my life in the next 3 weeks. The closest experience I've had is on the Appalachian Trail, where you briefly meet someone, and sometimes learn something about them that blows your mind.

I would have to say, that one of the craziest bits was meeting the CEO of the hospital and having him keep up with me the entire time. He loves Pickleball, and apparently many of the doctors are into as well. It is very possible that I influenced them to be more careful on the court...but let me tell you about the medical folks that cared for me...it's the part I don't want to forget.