Ruined left shoulder
May 23, 2007
Mammoth 2005- Day after thanks giving- I find myself laying on the floor next to a downhill box. what happened? it all happened so fast. All I knew was one minute I was at the lip and now I find myself lying on the floor. I try to get up, but wait. I can’t move my arm. this is entirely new. A pain that I have never experienced before. It was kind of interesting, it hurt yeah, but it wasn’t the kind of pain I thought a break would be. Maybe it was the adrenaline rush or maybe I was just trying to ignore it, but I always imagined a break would hurt so much more. So here’s the lowdown on what happened. I was hauling toward this lip, don’t know why but I was. I decided to bail out at the last minute and forget the box, after all it will be there next run. But no, I decide on another last minute decision to go for it. Whats the worst that can happen right? So as I’m hauling up to this lip at a perpendicular angle, I feel that something is wrong…very wrong. I pop and begin the 270 rotation and I guess I catch my nose on the box or there was something sharp sticking out, either way something caught and ruined the rotation throwing me off balance, atleast this is what I’m told. I do remember the next part though, I saw it from a third person perspective. Kind of scary when I think about how close to getting really hurt I was. I fall forward with all of my bodyweight centered on my left side, my shoulder is aimed at the box. This is going to hurt. I fall and keep falling, everything going in slow motion of course and hear it. The loudest crack I have ever heard. I get up slowly and painfully and time instantly speeds up. The pain hit so fast and so hard I didn’t believe it was real. My friends offered to get ski patrole but I refuse, after all. What kind of snowboarder am I if I can’t get up and get down a hill. For those of you that have been to Mammoth, I was at McCoy lodge (A.K.A. mid chalet) and had to snowboard to the bottom of Main lodge. Since this was the begining of the season there were only a few select runs open and I chose to ride down the one with the most moguls and the most people. Anyways thats boring, so I finally make it to Main lodge and refuse first aid, I thought it was going to cost me money and I had no money on me. I run to the bathroom, tear off my jacket and look. I see a huge lump on my left shoulder, incredibly painful to touch and immobile. awesome. My friends decided to get ski patrole for me and in hind sight I appreciate it, but at the time I wasn’t very happy with that. Mostly because I didn’t want to be a b****. Lovely. Anyways they talk me into going into the patrole and tell me it’s free. Now I’m sold. So they bandage me up, and sling me and say “we can’t tell you what it is for sure, go to Mammoth hospital.” Ok. I go and I sit there for about 3 minutes and they try and cut my shirts off. Now I happen to actually like these shirts so I refuse and we struggle to get a broken shoulder out of 2 layers of shirts. Woo Hoo it was like a party in my arm and every nerve was invited. Shirt comes off, and I am marched into the X-ray room where the technitian cracks a joke that isn’t funny, something about how he’s seen alot of me and blah blah blah. They come back to me and tell me my clavicle is broken in half and sort of splintered but nothing crazy, sling it up, bag it, ice it and it will be good as new in as little as 6 weeks. Okay… So I stay up in Mammoth with my friends to let them have a good time. I return to LA to go to a doctor, This is december 1. I think. Anyways I go and he tells me I have a mal form and the bones wont join back together. awesome. December 5th at 7:30am is my surgery date. Once again. Awesome. So I wake up and man I feel rough, I must have asked the lady the time atleast 12 times and my favorite line of the day I guess “MORE MORPHINE THIS HURTS LIKE F***!” So heres what I won in the surgery: A brand new titanium plate, five or six screws and a scar that is atleast seven inches long and a constant dullness in my shoulder. Lesson learned right? No.
Fast forward to February 17, 2007. I am once again in Mammoth, once again hauling down unbound. And I see my favorite kink rail. Nice lip, poppy with about a 2 foot gap and a 1 or so foot gap up. My favorite is to gap the flat and land on the downhill. Anyways, hauling down and gap. Land way too fast and too hard and my board slips from under my feet. Another loud POP and shooting pain. I immedietly yell and scream, get up and run to the lift line after unstrapping. I’m thinking “god damn I broke my shoulder again.” same pain sort of. Anyways I go to the ski patrole and they say go to the hospital. I go and they say it looks like a seperation and minor clavicle fractures. Awesome. So I go back to LA to a real doctor and he says its a seperation and that I can’t ride for 3 months. Anyways now I owe like $1,100.00 and need major help! I just turned 18 and the parents aren’t helping.
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