I tried.  Tuesday afternoon I was shaken but feeling positive, “oh, a few days of rest and I’ll be ok.” Tuesday night and Wednesday morning, not so much.  I made a bunch of calls on Wednesday morning, trying to find an ortho who could see me that day. No luck–and apparently most of them super specialize, and the offices all insisted I choose if wanted to see someone for my arm or my pelvis.  “but they both hurt like hell.” “Well, you have to decide which specialist you want to see.” Screw it. No appointment, the pain seemed like it was easing up, I figured I’d just tough it out.

10:15 Wednesday night, I was lying in bed trying to pretend the pain had not increased by multiples of thousands, and my back doctor returned my call. Bless this woman. I told her what was going on, and she told me to come in first thing the next morning.  I did, she checked me out, and sent me off to the imaging place, with more concerns than I thought.

I may not have been able to tough this out, but apparently I’m pretty fucking tough.  The next ten hours involved 4 MRIs, 7 X-rays, 1 CT scan, and 3 exams.

At the first MRI stop, after being told it would take 2-3 hours. Umm, do you have a chill pill or something?

Sorry, Mrs F, we’re an outpatient facility, so we don’t offer any medications.  We have headphones and music, it’s on classical already.

Find me the classic rock station and we’ll be in business, I can get lost in my youth–where I didn’t humiliate myself by breaking and tearing my body from a simple slip on ice.

Between the music and the two hours of sleep I was running on, I was able to stay very still, no panic in the tube.  Could have done without Van Halen’s “Jump,” though.

The doctor was in touch with the imaging center throughout, and it seemed that every test finished sent me to another.  Everyone was nice, but suspiciously nicer as time went on, particularly since I had to have been screwing everyone’s schedule, being pushed (figuratively) to the front of the line, staff and techs waiting for me to hobble in at each new stop.

Can I please go get tea before the next one?

I’m sorry Mrs Fringe, they’re waiting for you.

Again and again.

Finally, one woman said I could get tea while they burned the images of all the tests onto cd.  Yay! When I limped back in, she told me my doctor was waiting for me to call her. I know, I know, by this time it was clear I’m looking at some serious injury, but by then 7 hours had passed, 8 since my morning coffee–a woman needs a cup of tea–and some of us need several!

Every time I thought I was finished, I was sent to the next test, the next building.  I stripped so many damn times by the time I reached the last X-ray tech I expected her to stick dollar bills in my underwear. By then I knew I had 4 fractures, why did I need more X-rays? The day ended at the office of a special trauma orthopedist, his physician’s assistant, his orthotist, his secretary, and the cleaning crew–clearly waiting and wondering when this patient would leave so they could do their jobs.

So. Despite that first X-ray done at the urgent care place, my arm is fractured, and now encased in a super duper molded to my arm but removable for showering cast.  The rest of it….As I understand it, there are three types of bones that make up the triangular shape of the pelvis.  I have fractures in all three, including one that extends to the hip socket. I would make a joke about not doing things half-assed, but I’m pretty sure this yields the very definition of half-assed.

Dogwalking is out of the question for the time being. I didn’t actually ask about typing, I figure I’ll just go slower and less verbose than usual, stop when it hurts.

On the positive side, even though I feel like I’m completely out of shape, all the past yoga left me in good enough shape that I don’t need total bed rest, can hobble with the cane when I need to, yanno, live.  And I think this gives me the perfect opportunity to catch up on my reading.