Breaking My Wrist

Chapter The First: In Which the Hero Takes a Most Unfortunate Bike Ride

It was Memorial Day, and Stephen was bored. He was incredibly bored. His friends were out doing things, and he was at home playing on the computer. The weather report kept saying there was going to be a severe thunderstorm, but the sky outside was blue and clear. Thinking to capitalize on this, Stephen had the idea to go outside. More specifically, he had the idea to ride his bicycle.

So Stephen went outside to the utility shed aside his house and found his bicycle piled in among the lawn mower and other assorted lawncare paraphernalia. The tires were fortuitously full, so he grabbed his father's helmet and sped off.

Instantly invigorated by the air rushing by him, Stephen rode all about the town, just riding for its own sake and for that of taking in the sights and sounds of Chapel Hill and Carrboro. He traced a great arc through the university campus and downtown Chapel Hill before stumbling onto the Bolin Creek Bike Trail, which began near the community center and continued underneath Franklin Street and meandered with the creek until dumping its travelers onto the busy part of Airport Road.

Stephen was starting to get a little tired at this point, so he wanted to try finding the best route home. Waiting patiently for a lull in traffic, he crossed the street and rode along Airport Road toward downtown Chapel Hill. Just prior to the turn off for the city hall and the fire department, he took a road called Longview, which he thought he knew to connect through to Rosemary Street somehow. Exploring therein, he found himself on one steeply-sloping Trinity Court. The breeze whipped against his face and arms, and he felt like he was soaring as he cruised downhill. Suddenly, Stephen noticed a rather significant-looking, but unmarked, speed bump in the road. He applied the brake, but too late.

Chapter The Second: In Which the Hero is Brought to UNC Memorial Hospital and Withstands the Emergency Room

The bicycle flew out of control. A whirl of shapes, sounds, images, and sensations flew past Stephen like some kind of tornado tearing apart a small town in Kansas. When he regained normal human perception, he at first thought he might be dreaming. As he was carried by stretcher onto the ambulance that had arrived just prior, the bizarre truth began to hit him.

Stephen took comfort in that assurance and relaxed a little bit, safe in the knowledge that everything would be all right. He managed to give the paramedic contact information for his parents, but he was unable to think what day it was or precisely what had happened to him.

At length, Stephen found himself moving again. Apparently the ambulance had arrived and he was being wheeled into UNC Memorial Hospital's well-equipped but over-burdened Emergency Room. The employees there moved him from the stretcher to a bed, and he lay there, comtemplating, while his father was finally contacted.

I will take a moment here to describe Stephen's injuries. There were dermal abrasions on both knees (skinned knees) and one elbow, as well as the opposite shoulder and three parts of the face: the tip of the nose, the left cheek, and around the right side of the mouth. Blood and dirt from these three places, however, hadcovered the whole face, making the injuries look much worse than they were. In addition, his palms, especially the left, were pretty badly torn up. On top of all of this, however, was the peculiar angle at which his left wrist was cast.

When he arrived, the father demanded that something be done with his son.

Despite the tactless bluntness of the statement, it was the instruction, calm down, that provoked the father's ire, due to its condescending nature. The conversation was either moved out of Stephen's earshot then, or he just tuned it out. The outcome can be surmised, however, because it was around this time that Stephen began to receive more intensive medical attention. His blood pressure was taken. An IV was inserted. Shortly thereafter, an x-ray was made of his dubious-looking wrist, found indeed to be broken. Throughout the evening, several procedures took place. There was a CAT scan, several x-rays, a bone-setting session, and a Wendy's meal before midnight arrived. It was determined that the bone had not been set perfectly earlier in the night, so a surgery was ordered for the next morning.

As a precaution before surgery, patients are generally not allowed to eat or drink for some period of time beforehand. For Stephen, this fell at about midnight, after which he wasn't to eat or drink. His last meal was from the in-hospital Wendy's, and it was a couple of chicken strips and a cold chocolate milkshake.

After eating this kingly meal (as it was perceived), Stephen was taken to a room for sleeping.

Chapter the Third: In Which the Hero Spends His First Night at the Hospital and Undergoes Corrective Limb Surgery

The night was rough. While he was able to fall asleep rather quickly, Stephen woke up several times during the night, and each time his mouth was a little drier. However, since he had surgery the next morning, he wan't allowed to eat or drink anything. His mother was staying at his bedside, and he kept asking her for something to drink. Eventually she managed to get the nurse, whose name was Scott, to bring a cup of ice. That was all. Just a cup of ice. Stephen was glad of it, though, and the cool ice melted quickly in his mouth.

Early the next morning, Scott came in to eliminate the evidence of the ice. Apparently even water and ice were supposed to be denied to those going into surgery.

This is probably a good time to discuss the operation that Stephen was to have that day. His radius, which is one of the two arms that form, together, the forearm, had a distal fracture known as a Colles' fracture. This is common in falls when the victim puts his hands in front of him to catch himself.

In order to set the bone properly, it was deemed necessary to graft a titanium plate onto the bone to hold it in its correct position while it healed. An incision would be necessary on the underside of the wrist to gain access to the places where the bones were broken. After the surgery, a temporary metal pin was to be inserted to keep the bones in proper alignment while healing took place. The orthopedic surgeon who was to perform the surgery strongly recommended general anesthetic so that Stephen would be able to be completely asleep during surgery.

Stephen and his mother spent the morning waiting for the surgery (which had been scheduled for first thing in the morning). Finally, at about 10:00, someone came and wheeled Stephen down to the operating room. There was a brief meeting with the anesthesiologist, and then Stephen went back to surgery, his parents waiting anxiously in a nearby waiting room. When he got into the operating room itself, Stephen was given a mask with pure oxygen, then an intravenous sedative, and then he fell asleep.

What must have been several hours later, Stephen woke up in the recovery area. Three doctors in white lab coats were standing around his bed, talking. When they realized he was awake, they turned to speak to him. After introducing themselves as neurologists, they explained to him that he had had a "little seizure" as he was coming out of the anesthetic. Soon his parents were there, looking really concerned, and making sure he was okay. Stephen assured them that he was going to be fine, and eventually they left him alone and talked with the neurologists. After what seemed like forever, he was wheeled back up to his room for dinner, which was the only truly tasty meal he had in the whole stay. It was tasty chicken. The neurologists ordered an MRI (or magnetic resonance imaging) scan as well as an EEG (or electro-encephalograph), because seizures can be caused by brain tumors, and they wanted to make sure Stephen didn't have a brain tumor. However, since it wasn't absolutely urgent, he would have to wait until the next day before they could perform the studies.

As soon as Stephen was adjusted and prepared for yet another night in the hospital, someone appeared at his door with a wheelchair "to take him to the MRI." Slightly annoyed, Stephen and his mother went down to the MRI complex. Stephen had experience with the MRI machine; he'd had one before. He knew them to be cramped, noisy, and lengthy. The technician gave him some earplugs, and then sent him into the cramped tunnel and started making banging noises, during which Stephen had to keep completely still. The process took about forty-five minutes, after which Stephen was returned to his room.

Chapter the Fourth: In Which the Hero Has a Battery of Tests Run on His Head and Is Visited by His Techie Friends

The next day, two things remained to happen to Stephen before he was to be discharged. He needed to visit the dental clinic to make sure his teeth were still intact, and he still needed to get his EEG. These were the only things standing in the way of Stephen's discharge.

At 11:45, Stephen made a phone call.
"Mr. Sorrells," the voice on the other end said wearily.
"Hi, Mr. Sorrells. This is Stephen Toul," Stephen said.
"Hi, Stephen Toul," Sorrells said, clearly surprised. "Where are you?"
"I'm in the hospital, actually," Stephen explained. "I broke my wrist riding my bike and had to have surgery."
"Are you okay?"
"Yeah, I think so."
"Good. Get better. I'll go ahead and mark you absent. Everyone, tell Mr. Toul to get better," he said loudly.

At this point, the class began to holler for Stephen to get better. At the hospital, the first smile in several days began to creep across Stephen's lips. After saying farewell, he hung up the telephone, still smiling.

A few minutes later, someone came to take him to the dental clinic. The dentist was able to tell him only that his teeth were very lucky. She mentioned some "mobility" in the section of lower front teeth. This means that they were a little bit loose. She mentioned the minor possibility of a root canal, but Stephen felt doubtful where that was concerned. After all, fate wouldn't be that unkind, would it?

He went back to his room for lunch, then zoned out for awhile, waiting for someone to take him to his EEG.

At about 4:00, there came a knock at the door, followed by stillness. This was unusual. Before this, every knock at the door had been followed by immediate entry. Stephen's mother called out, "come on in," but there was only stillness. Finally, she got up, went to the door, and opened it. Standing there were two of Stephen's favorite people in the world: a pair of techies, one carrying a pretzel.

Tanner stood back, possibly intimidated by the presence of Stephen's parents. Katie, on the other hand, rushed to the bed and tried to find a place to hug Stephen that wouldn't break him further. She was unsuccessful, however, and just sat at his side, peltering him with questions.

After Stephen had visited with his friends for a while, a woman with a cart came in. The cart carried a computer, along with a bunch of other equipment that he didn't recognize. He could only come to the obvious conclusion that this woman was here to administer the EEG. Now is probably a good time to remind the reader that EEG stands for electro-encephalograph. Basically, it maps electrical activity in different parts of the brain while the subject is asked to do a variety of rudimentary things: answer simple questions, open and close their eyes, and things of that kind.

Stephen thanked his friends for the pretzel, and then they got out of the way so that the woman with the EEG could do her work. She started by making precision measurements of his Stephen's scalp and writing on it with a pen. Then she used some sort of paste to glue a couple dozen electrodes to precise points on the scalp. This whole process took about fifteen minutes, and then the EEG began. Stephen closed his eyes as instructed and opened them again when asked to. Over the next fifteen minutes, he did several simple things: blinked his eyes, answered simple questions, hyperventilated.

Yes. At the prompt of the EEG technician, he hyperventilated. Apparently it starves the brain of oxygen, and this reveals interesting electrical patterns. It also made Stephen's extremities tingle substantially. Afterward, he was shaking involuntarily, which was unusual to the technician, who asked "Why are you shivering? Are you cold?"

Stephen shrugged. "No. I don't know why I'm shaking."

She checked some things on her equipment, but couldn't find anything and decided to ignore it. After a few minutes of repeated simple actions, the EEG was done, and she began to extract her equipment from Stephen's hair. She didn't bother removing the paste or erasing the pen-marks from the scalp, though. Stephen figured he'd do that in the bath when he finally went home. This thought spurred Stephen to think of something. Now that the EEG was done, there was nothing remaining to keep him in the hospital. He ate his pretzel excitedly, confident that he'd be released before nightfall.

And indeed, a doctor came in at about 8:00, promising to try to get things out of the way so Stephen could finally go home. However, the nine o'clock hour came, followed by ten, and there were no signs of impending dismissal. In fact, a nurse brought in the menu for breakfast the next morning. It seemed that Stephen would need to spend the night, after all.

Chapter the Fifth: In Which the Hero Leaves the Hospital and Adjusts to One-Handed Life

It was ten o'clock the next morning before the hospital finally got things together for Stephen to be discharged. He was wheeled down to the lobby of the hospital, where he walked to his father's waiting Toyota Camry. At long last, at the conclusion of a four-day, three-night stay at the hospital, Stephen was on his way to a warm bath and a cozy bed, which he took advantage of in exactly that order.

That afternoon, he had a happy visit from his girlfriend, Leigha, and two other girls, Alyssa and Allison, as well as a young boy he'd never met, who proved to be Allison's younger brother, along for the scenery. They had apparently tried to visit him at the hospital, only to find that he was free. And so they visited him at his house, which made him incredibly happy, since Stephen liked to get visitors.

He talked to them for a time about his injuries, how they'd occurred, how long he'd be incapacitated, and such things, even showing off his cool-looking x-ray. Regrettably, it eventually came time for them to leave, and Stephen was once again left alone.

He took Friday off, sleeping and typing one-handed on the computer. In fact, he spent much of the weekend that way, escaping only to see The Ballad of Bobby Niles, a variety show featuring the music of Pablo Vega. He returned to school the following Monday, to discover that he had been excused from the final exams that were scheduled for Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday, essentially meaning that Stephen was completely done with school for the year. His friends were incredulous. Some even implied that the accident was a fortunate thing. Stephen simply sighed inwardly and knew better.

These first few days, Stephen dared not do anything more adventurous than to hold his left arm limply by his side. He exercised his fingers when he could, but the cast he was in restricted him from bending in certain ways. Namely, he could wiggle his fingers and that was about it. This made fine motor activities like holding things and manipulating things, even small things, virtually impossible. There was also a significant amount of pain that went with him at all times. Nonetheless, he was able to muddle through life with one hand. He soon mastered one-handed keyboard typing, getting up to an estimated 30 words per minute. He still needed help with some things, like tying his shoes, but was able to live a relatively normal life. He could almost write with his right hand, but nothing that he did write was ever legible.

It was not until much later, when his cast was removed, that he began to be able to use his left arm, which was dominant.

Chapter the Sixth: In Which the Hero Gets a Look at His Battle Wounds and Regains Partial Use of His Dominant Hand

Although injured, Stephen elected to fulfill his commitment to attend the UNC High School Music Camp at UNC-CH that summer. It took place the week after high school ended, and that was, remarkably, when his cast was scheduled to be removed. His parents made arrangements with Dan "The Man" Huff and his oral painkillers were entrusted to honorable counselor Jason. The first day's music theory evaluation was fairly difficult, considering that Stephen's writing hand was wrapped in plaster. However, he managed to be placed in the advanced theory class.

A few days later, about halfway through Music Camp, Stephen's parents picked him up and drove him to the UNC Hospitals Ambulatory Care Center, where his cast, stitches, and staples were removed. The surgeon had made a 4-inch incision down his wrist and later closed it with sixteen stitches and eleven metal staples. While these were being removed, Stephen felt minor pain, but it was far less pain than he would have felt were he looking at his wrist at the time. It wasn't until he was on his way upstairs to the "Hand Clinic" that he looked at his wound, and he was initially disgusted by the gruesomeness of the cut. Although it had been intentionally made with a surgical instrument, the incision looked like hell. The cold metal pin extending out just below the base of his thumb didn't help matters either. Fortunately, when he got upstairs to the Hand Clinic, he met his outstanding Hand Therapist, Kevin. Kevin was an Occupational Therapist in his late twenties or early thirties who molded a custom plastic splint for Stephen. The coolest thing about Kevin was his casual and humorous manner. As he showed Stephen how to improve his wrist's range of motion, he also bantered humorously with his partner. Before leaving, Stephen made an appointment with Kevin for the following week. The rest of Music Camp proceeded in a quite normal fashion, except that Stephen solved no Rubik's^TM Cubes that week.

Chapter the Seventh: In Which the Hero Overcomes His Disability and Has a Fulfilling and Enjoyable Life

Over the next few weeks, Stephen re-learned many motions he had forgotten: flexion, extension, supination, pronation, grasping, and pinching. These motions provided the building blocks for more advanced activities such as writing, typing, and driving. The metal pin was removed from the side of his wrist, the scar healed, and he regained at least 90% of his original range of motion. He flew on airplanes and--to his surprise--never set off metal detectors, although he had a plate approximately the size of a door key screwed to his radius. Once he underwent a wand screening (for refusing to remove his shoes) and had to explain to the TSA official that he had a surgical implant. He was sad when he had to leave the Chapel Hill Hand Clinic; he had come to enjoy his time with Kevin.

To this day, Stephen blames his wrist for certain shortcomings. Whenever he tries to throw his candy bar wrappers into the trash can from ten feet away and fails, he tells himself that he would have been able to make the shot before breaking his wrist. He also constantly worries that anyone who catches sight of his scar will assume incorrectly that he once attempted to slit his own wrists. To date, he has stayed away from bicycles and maintains that an alligator attack caused him to sustain his injuries. You and I, dear reader, know better.