I've been playing roller derby for over 3 years, and in that time I have had my fair share of bumps, bruises and sprains.
My first derby injury was a GIANT bruise right on the crease of my buttcheek where I landed on a skate. It was disgusting and painful, and awesome! I was so proud of it, my boyfriend at the time was disgusted by it and wouldn't even help me take a picture. It may have been a bad bruise, but it didn't stop me from skating.
2 weeks before our first home bout, I rolled my ankle at practice. Now this particular injury was ridiculous considering I was just standing there when it happened. I had just gotten new wheels and bearings, and was testing them out for the first time. We lined up for the first jam, I got up on 1 toe stop and as I started to pop up on the other one I lost my balance and rolled my ankle over the top of my foot that was up on the toe stop. There was no whistle to start the jam, there was no big blowout hit. Just clumsy Jackers injuring herself. I iced and elevated it, but after taking a nap it had trippled in size so I went to the emergency room that night. Turns out, I had extensive ligament damage all through my ankle but no break. The ER doctor told me to stay off skates for 2 weeks and follow up with my regular doctor. Yeah, that whole 2 week restriction just wasn't going to happen. There was no way I was going to miss our first home bout, so I wore the air cast to work, iced and elevated it when I could and called my regular doctor 4 days later to have him release me. Looking back, that was really stupid and only extended the healing time for that ankle, but I don't regret it, like I said, there was no way I was going to miss our first home bout. 9 months later, I wore high heals all night on New Year's Eve and wouldn't you know I woke up with a swollen ankle. I later read that it takes over 350 days to rehab a ligament, oops.
Since then, I have had bruises, sore muscles, velcro scratches, a hairline fracture in my hand from getting it squished between the floor and a skate, and I will forever have shins that resemble strips of cooked bacon since there are so many dents and dings. The hairline fracture in my hand was another time that I didn't exactly follow recovery suggestions, I knew it was bad considering it looked like my knuckles had swallowed a golf ball, but instead of going to the emergency room I just iced it in my bucket of beers at the afterparty. I mean, why not wait until the morning and go to prompt care?
I've seen multiple broken ankles, tibias and fibulas, surgeries to install pins and plates, torn ACLs, MCLs and PCLs and all sorts of knee injuries but luckily the derby guardian angels have spared me from anything so serious.
2 weeks ago when we were playing in Chicago, I fell on another player's skate, while it was going in the opposite direction of me. You know that law about an object in motion will stay in motion unless acted on by another force? Yeah, my knee demonstrated that for me when coming in contact with that skate. I felt the jolt, I felt the pain all the way into my toes and I knew it wasn't going to be good. This happened right at the end of a jam, so taking an extra second to get up didn't affect game play at all, meaning they didn't have to call the jam and call medical personnel in to help me. I skated back to the bench favoring my right leg, and trying to keep my my left leg as still as possible. As soon as I got back to the bench I asked a teammate to grab me an ice pack from our emergency kit, while I took off my kneepad. About that time, the adrenaline started to wear off and I started to get upset because I knew that I was actually injured and not going to be skating the rest of the bout (which was almost over anyway). I missed the last jam, and I missed the high fives while I was in a blur of tears, range of motion, poking and prodding coming from the EMTs and frustration as I sat on the sidelines at the end of the bout. The blunt force trauma from the contact with the other skate happened just above my kneecap, and there was a lot of swelling taking over that part of my leg. My team grabbed all my gear, my water bottle and helped me upstairs to the locker room. Most of my team dispursed right away, which I actually appreciate. Many of them have never seen me cry before, and I am not a big fan of crying, so I was glad they weren't all in my face about it. I also appreciate the teammates that did help me though, I couldn't have done it alone. My teammates even shuffled things around so I could ride home in a car that was not staying for the after party, and they were so accomodating by moving things around so I could sit in the front seat and prop it up. I tried icing and elevating it for a few days, but it was still very swollen and I had lost some of my range of motion due to how tight the skin was, plus it felt like the pressure might explode right out of my skin when I tried to bear weight on it.
After a visit to a sports rehab clinic, some kinesio tape and stretches, and a visit to my regular doctor I ended up with light duty restrictions at work and no skating for a few weeks with a deep tissue contusion. I am actually following doctor's orders this time, because the nature of this injury worries me that it is going to be one of those injuries that you think is all healed up until the first time you fall on it again. (also, a little pre-derby Jackie history: I had an impact induced blood clot in high school, I was on crutches for 3 months, ended up with a nasty wound and I still don't have feeling in that part of my leg). I'm not trying to do that again, and I'm really not trying to retire from derby yet. I am taking the restrictions seriously, icing and elevating, using a crutch if I am going to be on it a lot, swimming and doing low impact workouts to maintain my strength and endurance I have built up, and I even took a medical leave of absence for a few weeks to really make myself commit to not skating and messing it up worse.
Light duty at work means working in the office on day shift, which sounds nice and cushy but it is KILLING me. I was not cut out for office work, I am so bored! I am certainly not complaining about being able to drink my coffee while I work, or the fact that there is air conditioning in this part of the plant, but I am actually ready to get back to my regular job. Lucky for me, the plant is closed next week AND we are going on hiatus for derby, so it is like my calendar built in some extra rehab time. Working on day shift is giving me a glimpse at what life will be like in 6 months when I switch shifts, and it certainly has it's pros and cons. The jury is still out on how my body is going to adjust to being a normal human, more on that later I think.
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