Current Status

So this happened on the commute home from work on the Central Valley Greenway...a stealthy blue Jeep Liberty jumped out of nowhere in front of me at Lakewood and North Grandview. Apparently I took a good chunk out of the front quarter panel and door, flew over, and struck ground. I don't remember anything until EMS were in my face, but there are pics of me sitting up with the help of other cyclists, the driver, and witnesses. One dude even took pics and sent them to me, I don't remember any of it. I still need to find out what actually happened. Apparently I was out of it, EMS neck braced me and I got a cool ride to VGH.

Got all my spandex cycling gear cut off.....despite all the loss, the VPD, EMS and staff at VGH ER were been awesome. Obviously they were concerned about head injury and spinal injury....so far I don't think there's any big damage like that. I was held 12 hours due to bruised lung that they want to xray 6 hours later due to concern of a collapsed lung. I was released 6am on Friday. Mr. P was with me until I sent him home, then he was back at 4:30am to come fetch me.

Broken elbow, bruised ribs on entire LHS of body, broken tooth, lots of cuts and lacerations, but I'm sooo lucky considering I wasn't going slow when I hit the vehicle. I'm all jolted and sore but thankful it wasn't worse! My big meat carcass almost took out a Jeep! Apparently the bike is okay and my helmet didn't smush so I guess my body took the brunt. I'm all bandaged now, maybe some cool scars but counting my lucky stars!

Now, Day five: Ribs and back are the hurting the most, x-ray on elbow tomorrow...hopefully I won't have to keep arm slinged anymore though forearm has very limited mobility currently. Cuts are scabbing now and I'm not wearing bandages on anything anymore. Things are slowly but gradually healing. I was also fortunate the broken tooth was a wisdom tooth and there isn't a whole lot of sensitivity on the exposed part, however my dentist has suggested extraction anyways.

Everything is being processed by ICBC and it's possible I might have to involve a lawyer, etc.

My work laptop was destroyed in the crash, I'm at the office today building a new image on a new machine. Since I'm tiring so quickly this week, I doubt I'm going to be working any full days this week, and since I'm on vacation next week, this is going to be giving me some needed time to heal.

I'm sooo lucky, despite it all, it could've easily gone so much worse.

Update: Day 6: Ribs are still sore as hell but definitely a bit better each day. I went to Orthotics Specialist today who said I could stop wearing the arm sling and start stretching and exercising my right arm. What a relief. Bad news: lots of damage to my bike. The shop says it will almost be simpler to buy a new one rather than replace all the parts that need replacement on my current one. Fuck. It's looking more and more like I'm going to need a lawyer. Luckily I have some friends who have been able to recommend some that specialize in cyclists and dealing with ICBC. I have bruises bubbling up in interesting places. Here's hoping I'm in decent enough shape to enjoy some Pride events this weekend!