A bit of an accident

Oh. My. Word.  How in the world?  I feel like a nincompoop!  

I had a bit of a bicycle accident.  Just a wee accident.

We opted to ride on the canal...most of the mountain bike trails were closed due to the rainy days preceding our ride.  The ride was great!   We saw neat things, I felt great!

I felt so good that when we made it back to the car after an hour and a half of riding we weren’t done.  So we decided to go another 3-4 miles down the canal in the opposite direction.   We reached our turn around point and we decided to ride through the picnic area.   We headed down a hill and it was great!   Until my hat flew off my head.  (Yes, I said hat and not helmet..it was an easy gentle ride on a graded flat surface, I never wear a helmet on the canal!). But, when my hat flew off my head, I jerked and lost control of the bike on a small patch of gravel. At the same time, we assume that I grabbed my left brake...front wheel brakes and locked them up....which caused me to go over the handlebars.   I remember hitting and watching my glasses bend and scrap across my face as I landed. 

You see, I flew and fell face first.  Yes.  Face first.   My bottom lip rolled back as I came to a heaping halt....filling my mouth with dirt and mud and causing lacerations and brush burns inside my mouth.  That was the first thing I noticed as soon as Jason got me untangled from my bike.  

I was shaken up.  Really bad.  Dirt covered my face.  

Why yes, as any true blogger would, I took a picture within a few minutes. I did wait until we got the blood to clot and basically stop but I snapped the pic before we cleaned my face up.  It was obvious that my eye and cheek were swelling mere moments after the accident. 

I eventually got myself up...and back onto the bike.  Why yes, I rode the 3-4 miles back to the car.  Slowly...and crying from the pain in my shoulder/chest/back the whole way.  Not sobbing just silent tears of pain.

So injuries?  

***Cut on my eye and a black eye.

***fat lip and cuts inside my mouth (thankfully my teeth remained intact with no breaks or issues)

***my right arm has a road rash (brush burn)

***bruises all up and down my right hip and leg

***minor brush burns and bruises on various parts of my body.

*** ‘something’ is wrong with my upper right quadrant’. It could be a broken/cracked rib.  It could be a pulled muscle.  It hurts to move in certain ways.  It hurts to bend over.  It hurts to cough....laugh...sneeze.   I am leaning toward a pulled muscle.  I did opt to not go to the ER.  A cracked rib or pulled muscle would just result in an official diagnosis and a bottle of pills  (which I wouldn’t take anyway).   The risks of going into an ER in the middle of a pandemic outweighed the benefits of a true diagnosis! We are watching carefully my heart rate  (which has regulated back to normal after the first 24 hours but boy was it high for quite a few hours) and my breathing (which is fine).  If anything changes I will be at the urgent care quicker than anything!  

I’m healing....slowly...the worst is the pain from the ribs/muscle/whatever.  It is debilitating.  I can’t even dress myself without gasping in pain.  Yes, Jason is dressing me.  Hahaha

The bike injuries?

*** I mangled up my grips.  I will be replacing them as soon as I can!!!  Jason has to put my chain back in place before I ride it...but she seemed to ride ok.

I’m banged up good...but I’ll be ok.   I will never again ride without my helmet.  I still would have gone down.  I would still be bruised and battered and have a fat lip.    I probably wouldn’t have a black eye though!   I also wouldn’t have come close to having some kind of major head injury.    So wear your helmets please!!!!