Wow! An entire week without blogging. Am I getting too casual, too laissez-faire about this entire recovery? Have I gone soft and sunken into a codeine induced slumber which keeps me from donning the headset microphone in talking about life while my computer screen fills with words? Have I been up at 5:30 in the morning biking, running, or swimming?

Well, the good and the bad news is that the answer to all the above questions is, “NO!”.

NOTE: I am going to ramble on about life for a couple of paragraphs. I know a lot of people are reading this who are also going through recovery of a broken clavicle. Scroll down a way and I will have a bold heading that says, “let’s talk clavicle”, if this is too boring for you.

I went to see Lino last Friday in Sacramento. He was great, of course. Annie and Zed and Kieran came along as we had a fun day planned in Sacramento. One minute a beastly therapist was twisting my swollen finger while I cried out in pain, and a few minutes later I’m sitting on a choo-choo train at Funderland. The excitement never stops.

Sunday was Zed’s fifth birthday party. Perfect weather, a huge sushi boat, and a house and yard full of friends. Not a bad way to spend a weekend. 15 kids got along so well, no one could believe it. The older they get the easier it gets. For a least a few more years.

LET’S TALK CLAVICLE

Getting a lot a good movement from the physical therapy. I have the exercises from the Hospital PT, and the stuff that Lino likes me to do. Saturday I went swimming with the Masters. It was my first time back with them and it felt so good. I did 42 laps, about a third of what makes a good workout normally, but it felt at least three times better than not doing it so — definite net gain. It is a mix of breaststroke, freestyle, and back. It’s funny, on the freestyle my right fingers drag across the water during recovery and entry is just past my ear. Those are two features of a really good stroke. I’ll have to see if I carry that over to my normal stroke when I get back to it.

Yesterday I went to a woman who does lymphatic therapy. She put these very tight fitting gloves on my hand and did all sorts of manipulation of my arm, shoulder, lymphatic system. Tonight my friend is coming over to lay his hands on me and pray again. The last time he did it was the only time I have been able to make a fist since this happened. I am leaving no stone unturned in my journey back.

So here comes the bummer. You didn’t think it was going to be all good, did you?

Yesterday I went to see Dr. Soto for my third biweekly postoperative appointment. The straight on x-ray of my clavicle looked really good, but the one that shoots up at the 25° angle showed, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that one side of my fracture is not knitting back to the bone.

In the interest of long-term strength, we decided it would be best to do a bone graft from my leg as soon as possible.

“Wait a minute my big bald friend… it’s all been sounding so good. You’re not going back under the knife, you’re almost healed, ready to get back on the road and having fun.”

For maximum comic effect, this is where I would tell you that I’m kidding. But no such luck today. Surgery is being scheduled as we speak :(

I think it’s actually a good thing. One of the breaks has thrown down so much bone that x-ray doesn’t even show where it was. The other break has had literally no change. This bone graft will certainly speed the recovery, as opposed to waiting, and waiting, and waiting… As we clearly established throughout this blog, I am not an extremely patient man.

I went swimming again today at the noontime masters meeting. Only made it 36 laps before I had a very definite feeling that I should stop. I hadn’t taken a pain pill since five in the morning. I’ll swim one more day this week and try to get to 1500 yards.

Since I wrote that last paragraph, my friend Craig came by and did his hands-on healing. I could tell you how amazing it was, but I thought it would be better to toss in this short video clip.

He wants to come by and do it one more time before I get my preoperative x-ray. I am all about it. It was very powerful, relaxing, and as you can see, undeniably effective. Craig doesn’t try to explain it — and I didn’t ask any questions.

That’s the life stuff. That’s the healing stuff.

Stay safe.