Wednesday June 5th - The day we bought Jake a skateboard to celebrate his successful year, but also as a means of transportation home from school.
Thusday June 6th - I blogged about it, talking about all he overcame during that school year and how we were celebrating having our son back after dealing with PCS for so many years. I did actually wonder if I was overdoing it after I wrote it. I mean, he had definitely come a loooong way in his recovery, but as many know, you never fully overcome PCS, you just wait out the physical symptoms, and then learn to deal with the residual affects. Plus, Jake would always have anxiety, but that day I was focusing on the PCS recovery. No matter, we were happy and Jake had overcome many obstacles and fears over the year. It was a good day.
Sunday June 9th - Jake broke his leg (tibia and fibula, compound / open fracture). He was told that he cannot ride BMX for a year and was in for a long recovery.
Today, Sept 20th.
I cannot pinpoint why it has taken me so long to write about this experience. Possibly because I felt initial guilt about saying we overcame PCS while so many others are still wading in a cesspool of symptoms. Or possibly because I may have jinxed Jake's success by "bragging" / blogging about it. Or maybe because thinking back I can still hear the sirens and feel his pain as I watched him deal with the pain and anxiety.
But I do need to write about it, for myself, but also to celebrate what did come from the experience. We saw evidence of Jake's ability to move past his anxieties and actually use some of Cognitive Behaviour Therapy strategies he had learnt over the years.
June 9th - Jake came to me to ask if I would take him to the mall to buy him a pair of new shoes. I told him I was working around the house all day and not going out, so he decided to go to Shell, the local skatepark to ride.
No more than 15 minutes after he left I got a phone call from a stranger saying that Jake was at Shell and had broken his leg. My first question was "Are you sure? He just left the house!" My second question was "Did he hit his head?"
Thankfully, his head was fine , but he had broken the two bones in his leg and was in shock. When I arrived I was glad for the shock, as it meant that he could not feel the pain. He even asked me if he had to go to school the next day! "No Jake, you are off the hook for schook for quite some time buddy!"
He was so brave, lying there in the bottom of the concrete bowl, waiting for the ambulance to arrive. I am thankful for the older BMX rider who ripped off his Tshirt to wrap around Jake's leg to stop the bleeding and held it there without moving for 20 minutes until the paramedics arrived. And to the mom who gave us a bottle of water and a facecloth to cover Jake's eyes.
Long story short, Jake had 2 surgeries and spent 8 days in hospital on a morphine and antibiotic drip. And the whole time he asked question after question, to whoever was near him, the paramedics in the ambulance, the nurses in ER, even the orderly pushing his bed to the OR. "Will it hurt when they operate? Will I feel anything? Will I know when it is over? What if I walk up and can feel it? Will they put me sleep before they give me a needle? I want to be put out for everything!"
Jake was finally putting all the CBT that he thought was irrelevant, to use. He did not even realize it but by asking those questions instead of internalizing the anxiety, he was using the coping strategies that he had never been able to relate to his own anxieties.
So, I now realize that I did not jinx things for Jake. Instead, I accept that everything happens for a reason and the reason for this happening was for Jake to see that he is actually able to cope with much more than he ever thought possible. And maybe to encourage him to slow down and spend some quality time with his family....lol, a mom can dream can't she?
August 13th - Jake made a speedy recovery (I credit the 8 days of bedrest in the hospital) and got his cast off earlier than expected, on August 13th. He will still need physio and cannot ride BMX again until the spring, and unfortunately the new skateboard has yet to be ridden. His life had revolved about riding so this is a difficult time for him and his social life. But that is all ok, a bone heals. A head does not always.
