Bone Broke

my recovery and training are still progressing. I am jogging during my walks and doing some controlled riding outside as well as my torture on the indoor trainer. the clavicle has been healing well. I will increase my riding and running as a result. can't wait to get back in the water!

whats the recovery diet look like?? here is today. many of these things are staples of my diet.

vega wfo w/coconut water!
Oat bars - see recipe below
Vega protein powder, soy yogurt, blueberries, strawberries, chia seeds
vega protein bar
tempeh, peppers, onions, tomatoes, black beans
 tofu & brussel sprouts.

 Oat Bars
2 cups oats - any kind from rolled to scottish
1 1/2 cups soy flour
1/4 cup ground fla seed
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup apple juice
1/2 cup nut butter
1/4 - 1/2 cup chopped nuts, seeds (pumpkin, sunflower,sesame), dried fruit, or chocolate chips or any combo

combine and press into a 9 inch pan. bake at 375 for 30 minutes. Line the pain with parchment for easy removal. Cut into bars and store on the counter or in the fridge for a few days.

FYI - I am selling a 2011 Cervelo R3 with sram rival comps in a 56. only about 100 miles on it. contact me if you are interested.

pride (in the name of love)

another reason why I strongly believe in crossfit is the real strength that I have gained through it has helped me in my injury recovery. It just gives you such balanced strength that I have a lot of compensation for my injury in support muscles. compensating musculature is a sweet thing. Meaning I can feel all of my supporting muscles for my clavicle taking up the slack. I don't have a lot of pain but i do get tired in my back and my chest when it is getting fatigued. For my second week of recovery. I started on the trainer and did my walks but I also started riding outside a bit too and well as adding a little bit of running back into my programming. The riding outside obviously i have to stabilie the bike and im picking up the road vibrations. but it not bad at all. The running is a little tougher so i am being cautious to not do too much too soon there.  I know many people think this insane and unnecessary but we all need to decide our own risk level in life.  It certainly isnt the conversative approach but I tend to be my own doctor to a degree. I listen to what my body is telling me it can or can't do and act accordingly. A doctor can give you hard numbers but he can't tell you what you feel like. Only you know that. It can be seen as pushing the envelope but i've never believed in commonly perceived boundaries. Overall I remain positive about my recovery. I have good ranges of motion in all directions and it feels better and stronger everyday. sometimes it is sore before bed but im dealing with it. overall it was a tough week. mostly due to the time change. it takes me awhile to deal with that. I know it is only an hour but it gets me so off schedule. Im waking up at 4:30 etc.  It is unnatural and hard on the body but im adjusting.

titanium expose

my thoughts on recovery after surgery. anyone that follows me knows that i've had a couple of surgery and had good results recovering from them in the past. Of course I find myself in this situation once again and I want to share what I do to recover sucessfully after surgery to treat an injury.

Immediately after the surgery I being trying to hydrate as much as possible. I want to flush all of those nasty but surgically necessary drugs from my system as fast as possible. Usually it is the surgical drugs that make you feel terrible after the surgery and getting rid of those as well hydrated makes you feel so much better. I hit coconut water. VEGA of course! I am also a big believer in Tea. I mainly drink herbal teas like roobios to avoid caffine but i also drink de-caf green tea. Your adding antioidents without adding calories. Of course after major surgery most people are on narcotics. Depending on your pain tolerance it is another necessary evil. However, I believe in order to recover well you need to get off of these as fast as you can tolerate. They are not putting your body in the optimal healing state. I try to take as little as I need to of any drugs for pain from narcotics to nsaids. Sometimes you need it but if you don't get yourself back to an alkaline healing state. There are more natural ways to control pain from ice treatments to moist heat. Ask yourself are you really in pain? or are you uncomfortable? If you have to ask your probably just uncomfortable. real pain pretty much shuts down thinking (at least for me it does). When I fell and broke my collarbone, that was pain, I didn't want to move it. Even though I never broke this bone before I knew it was broken before the medics arrived. I didn't need to be told it was. Coming out of surgery that was pain. a couple of days later. not so much. I also believe that cleaning up your diet and eating to recover helps you get there faster as well. I always make it a point to make sure I get enough protein. I believe that is even more important in this state. Eat a good variety of plants so your body isnt deficient in anyway and can focus on the job of healing. I am also a strong supporter of getting back to action in some form as soon as possible. The body is designed to move. Even while working around an injury you are not only keeping up your fitness level but you are creating the very important hormone levels to aid in healing. Athletes recovery from surgery faster than sedentary people. Because they move! Their bodies are used to recovering from hard training sessions. I think it is ok to still train hard but smart. You don't want to do anything to aggravate the injury. You also do not want to train to a point where you are slowing down your injury recovery but don't be afraid to move. I think many people after sustaining an injury become overly fearful. Healing is a progression. It gets better everyday. It isn't a situation where on day 39 your broken but magically on day 40 your fully healed. I go after range of motion as soon as possible. this is simply moving your own body. your not loading up with outside weight. range of motion is lost from simply not moving. i say move, get range then its time to work for strength. sleep is important too I notice I sleep more after surgery. I go with it. It's when the biggest healing happens. Ask questions from your doctor about when you can reasonable return to activities. Doctors are conservative. They are not going to tell you any earlier than they are completely confident it is healed. this isn't a bad thing but it is why I also choose to listen to my body. I research online what is typical post op recoveries for the procedure. For this injury I had the same surgery that lance armstrong had. Lance got back on the bike within a week, so did I. After that point what you can do for the most part is based off of your pain tolerance. it is going to hurt to move it. but it will hurt less everytime. Ranges will get better. Armstrong was fully recovered in 3 - 5 weeks. I also plan to be. Why? Because I am focused on healing. I get out of the way of letting the body do what it does. Eat well, MOVE, and sleep. Yesterday I rode the trainer for 1 hour and 15 minutes. Today I rode for 1 hour and 30 minutes. It is training around my injury, but it is also training something I will need to do. I work all of the position from bars, to hoods, to drops, to aero (praying) over the bars. I tried out some standing and riding today but im not ready for that yet.

staples out!

an hour on the trainer today and STAPLES ARE OUT! 3 more weeks of indoor riding. Then i go back to the doc and get another ray and it should be completely healed and ill be able to run and swim again at that time. I can go to the pool and do kicking stuff but no stroking. I also can walk but no running just yet. I don't have to wear the sling anymore until it gets sore and i need a break. overall the surgeon seemed impressed with the healing so far and i get back to a more regular life with it now.

i shall be released

yesterday - 4 mile walk outside. walking takes FOR-EV-ER! important thing to remember for ironman racing. even when walking seems like a good idea it is still really slow. try to avoid it when possible. looking forward to running again.

today - 45 minutes on the trainer. felt good. can't wait til it is strong enough to be outside in control of the bike instead of not moving anywhere but for a week after surgery im happy to be riding at all.

mostly i miss swimming a ton these last couple of weeks and really want to get back in the water. i know it is going to be a bit yet. I go back to the surgeon tomorrow to get my staples taken out and of course i will talk with him about when he thinks i should resume these activities. i will probably take whatever he says but also see how i feel. at this point i believe i am ahead of what a normal recovery schedule for this procedure would be. i haven't been wearing my sling all day today. Having the broken bone set with the plate has provided a lot of stability to it. it is just basically sore at this point. i do think it will feel much better once the tension of the staples is released too.

getting a ton of reading done. most likely ill be back to work on monday.

back in the saddle again

got on the trainer for 30 minutes today. i used the bars, hoods and drops. My surgical side obviously isn't as good but i was able to bear weight on it for the full time so i am happy with that. I am pretty much back to most of my regular activities, cooking, cleaning, etc. I am really looking forward to getting the staples out as that will make this a lot less tight all of the time. only a couple more days til friday. The surgeon and various other people are probably not going to be thrilled and give me garbage about riding my bike already but i don't really care all that much. If I can do it at this point i am going to do it.

1 plate, 6 screws and 21 staples later

1 plate, 6 screws and 21 staples later.... surgery is done and i am getting better. had a few bumps along the way. i have to go on the record and say i am not a fan of the dehydrating yourself before surgery. i have no issue with the fasting but i dont agree with the not drinking water for that long but more on that later! surgery at the hospital was interesting. got signed by the surgeon and waited for the setup for the procedure. A bunch of the paperwork later got an iv and some drugs and go ready for the show. first time i remember in the surgeon standing over me before my eyes were even open and him saying ... mary this if your favorite doctor.... how do you feel? my elegant response. "like i am going to vomit" and him going yep your fine. recovery room was pretty painful. morphine shots provided no real relief and i had 2 really annoying people on each side. crying and whining about how much pain they are in. couldn't want to get away from them. only to get back to my room and have the same situation with different people. I was able to drink juice, water and eat some graham crackers. then you can't go home until you pee. i pushed about 60 ounces of fluid and couldn't pee. eventually after 30 minutes in the bathroom i was able to force out some fluid and get ready to head home. got home and pretty much went right to bed. woke up with a fever of 102. not happy. more trouble trying to pee and a fever for 15 hours while trying to get the surgeons office to call me back. (4calls- welcome to the modern state of medicine) finally i called my regular doctor. I eventually heard from the on call surgeon and he said it was too soon for my surgery to be infected and most likely i had a urinary tract infection as a side effect from the surgical drugs. got my regular doctor to write me a script for antibiotics for the UTI and finally i was feeling better from the surgery. the following day i was able to take the dressings off and see the lovely 21 staples. can't wait for those to come out. It is a much longer incision than i thought. I also stopped taking narcotics and am just taking OTC ibuprofen. At this point i am feeling better and able to take care of myself pretty well. I think once these staples come out it is going to be all systems go. I go back to the surgeon on friday to get my staples out!!  I know i cant swim until the wound heals. but i can ride the trainer and walk without too much ado. so that is going to be the main focus initially. then running when i can handle the bouncing. I am reading michael phelps book right now and when he broke his wrist and they set it. he was riding a stationary bike everyday and swimming again in 10 days. I don't want to be down with this any longer than i have to and i don't want to sacrifice my race season because of it. it is a small speed bump. I got lucky that i didn't have any permenant injuries from the fall. The clavicle break isn't a huge deal. I am not going to let it sideline me for the season. whatever can be done will be done.