She fell...

When you are a little kid, falling is a weekly, if not daily (if not hourly, for my daughter) occurrence. But when you are old, falling is an event. As in: Did you hear about Kim? She had A Fall!

Walking my daughter's friend home in February, I fell. And with that fall, I crossed the threshold into old-ladydom. I slipped on some ice in front of the lovely foreclosure home a few houses down and I slammed into the ground at warp speed. I had my hands in my pockets and Lily's collar around my wrist. Lily is a dog that walks, at best, 2 miles an hour, so I am not one of those people getting pulled along like a damn fool by their dog. How is that even fun? Apologies; I digress.

So, hands in pocket, nothing to brace my fall, I am going down. And fast. I live in fear of my teeth being knocked out so I had the good sense to turn my head to the right. In doing that, my body turned that way as well and my left shoulder, hip and knee greeted the sidewalk.

I lay there in the cold, silently triaging myself. Can I move my neck? Yes. Flex my wrist? Yep. Arm? O.K.

Casey's friend Sara, who tops out at 40 pounds is holding her hand out, offering to help me up. I have a visual of Sara flying through the air as she attempts to help my injured ass off the ground so I refuse. Sara contents herself to chase Lily, who has made it about four sidewalk squares down. Meanwhile, I triage some more.

Ankle? So far so good. Knee - ouch, sore but mobile. The moment of truth arrives. I try to get up. Seriously intense pain rips through my hip. I am stuck on my hands and knees on my street. I am grateful for the foreclosed house, if only because there is no porch light on to illuminate my pathetic form. I move at the speed of Lily, slooooowly getting on two feet. I make the old person noise. My hip and shoulder begin to throb in unison. I am The Old Person That Fell. This was An Event.

I manage to get Sara the rest of the way home and make my way back the ten or so houses to my own. On the way I ponder how injured I really am. Any emergency room nurse will tell you that they need to be near death to seek treatment at their place of employment. I am no different.

Lily and I make our way into the house and discuss My Fall with Bill and Travis. They make the proper sympathetic inquiries and offer their help, but they don't really understand that I am dealing with two things - one physical and one mental. The physical, simple enough. 800mg Motrin, ice, wrap my knee. Move to vicodin when that doesn't work.

The remaining part is harder to wrap my brain around. I have evolved from the "bounce back from a fall young adult" to "the elderly fall victim". I know, 44 is not elderly, but damn! I still hurt and it's been 6 weeks! I limp when I am tired and my hip aches all the time. When I get to eight weeks of hip pain I will see someone about it. Because I am scared. And I have to get a mammogram soon and I can only handle one painful thing at a time. It effects my workouts and my regular work and my housework and my ability to lie on the floor and hug my dog and I am starting to get angry. Soon I will be a bitter, crabby old lady who falls. Pray for me friends. Light a candle for my acetabulum.