Well, it's been a month since I found myself as the meat in a car sandwich (see previous journal)... and my recovery from the accident seems to be going well. After a brief additional stint in hospital due to an infection and having to undergo the first ever surgery in my life to drain over 200ml of pus from my leg, I'm now back at home recovering with a leg brace on and can now start easing back on using crutches to get about on. My "elephant leg" is a lot less swollen now, and a lot less painful too which is encouraging. I'm officially "unfit for work" until the end of the second week of January, which by then I should be starting physiotherapy for my leg to help get it back into proper working order again.

I know that I was looking forward to a break from work after a particularly stressful year, but not like this... still, it could have been far far worse, as I saw in neighbouring rooms in my hospital ward while I was there. And I'm off work on full pay and getting regular district nurse support for dressing changes and ACC support for travel, housekeeping and physiotherapy which is good.

It's the little things that have been frustrating though. Things like showering, which after a few unsuccessful attempts to use plastic bags to keep my dressings dry in the shower has now been replaced by self-administered sponge baths, and getting pants on over my leg brace. Things that previously required little or no thought to do now turn into a significant (though thankfully reducing) effort to achieve, with new milestones being "can remove and put on own shoes" and "sit at table without needing my leg elevated".

But on the other hand, it does feel now that I'm seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. After a month where my world was Wellington Hospital, Te Whare Mayfurr, and the road between both places, today I was finally able to venture out of the house on a brief street walk (on crutches), and am now able to get about the house on using one crutch which now allows me to do "Long John Silver" impersonations. Yarrrr.

And all going well I should be able to have the leg brace removed in a couple of weeks after my fractured femur has healed up, another cause for celebration just before Christmas!

He aha te mea nui o te ao?
What is the most important thing in the world?
He tangata, he tangata, he tangata.
It is the people, it is the people, it is the people.
- Maori proverb

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