Reality Check

On February 3, 2007, An Expert Skier Wearing A Helmet Crashed into A Large "Ice Boulder" Next to the Trail. This Is A First-person Report to His Friends.

I'm hurt bad, boys. I am not feeling well from head to toe. I have a black eye, a bruised and swollen nose, I can't take deep breaths, can't laugh, sneeze, cough, blow my nose, or do anything that goes above normal breathing. I can't put any pressure on my right leg/hip. I can't bend over to even put on shoes. I am cold all of the time and shiver when I use up enough energy to just walk or go to the bathroom.

My helmet saved my life based on the scratches on it and how far it flew when it came off at impact. The doctor was hesitant to let me walk out, but he could not find anything seriously wrong with me to warrant being taken off the mountain via helicopter or ambulance. You should see my skies! They are ruined; the ski patrol took pictures of them.

Basically, I skied off the groomed portion of the trail on purpose. The trail was going from steep black to smooth blue. My wife and the kids went ahead. I skied down to them, dropped off the slope behind them to "pop up" up from below to fly off a little lip from the edge (we've all done it a million times). The slope dropped off about two feet and in my line was this three-foot diameter ice boulder. My skies bottomed out and ejected me head, ribs and pelvis first into this thing. I never had a chance.

The next thing I knew I was gasping for air in bloody mess of snow. I could see my helmet still rolling; I could hear my 12-year-old son screaming; then I saw my ski bent back. Once I got my breath, two guys skied up and said they had sent for help. We sent my son down to find my 10-year-old daughter. I tried to stand up to crawl out, but something inside my leg was "loose." I could not stand.

Once the sled arrived, I tried again and it still was loose. I had a great patroller that helped me out. He called ahead to prepare for internal injuries and possible evacuation off the mountain. I crawled into the Red Sled, rode sitting up, crawled out and on to the chair lift and got off it on my own.

A doctor on site checked me out. He found nothing wrong inside so they wheeled me out for an hour. Then he did x-rays and found no broken pelvis. What he thinks happened was I pushed my femur out to the point of dislocation before it popped back in (what I felt). I may have stretched or torn some tendons/ligaments or whatever by doing that, so my hip area is useless.

The news from a visit to the orthopedist a couple of days later wasn't all that good. As it turns out, I DO have a fracture in my hip socket. Two pieces of bone are floating around in my hip joint. He said they will most likely move towards the back, out of the way, and reattach themselves. He does not think they will need to be surgically removed and should not cause any problems down the road (pardon the pun for cycling friends). So in short, I'm on crutches for six weeks.

My black eye is from my goggles being pushed into my nose and eyes, otherwise I would have taken a direct hit with my forehead!! I kid you not!! Seriously guys... I am lucky to be here in this "condition" today.

February 23rd update:
My recovery is going S L O W. I bought a cane today. The crutches were getting cumbersome and the cane actually works better.

I hope my story can help sway someone to wear a helmet. We are spreading the word big-time down here in North Carolina.