Houston, we have a problem!

“Can you move your fingers?”  … Yes!

“Ok, lift your thumb.”  … Nothing

“You can’t lift your thumb?” … Nope

“Straighten your fingers for me.” … Nothing

Houston, we have a problem!  I remember the doctor mentioning the radial nerve, the ulnar nerve and what can go wrong.  From the looks of things, I have full feeling in my pinky and left ring finger and no tingling or numbness in those fingers, so the ulnar nerve survived the trauma.  However, I am unable to straighten my fingers or lift my wrist and the top of my hand and thumb are numb, which means that the radial nerve is not as lucky.  I have to admit that I’m freaking out and when I mention this to my surgeon he tells me that “he is not happy about it at all.”  Ugh!

Here’s a quick anatomy lesson:  There is a groove in the humerus that the radial nerve rests in and unfortunately, when there is a fracture and/or open repair involving screws and plates, the radial nerve can be traumatized and let’s just say – it can’t take a joke!

Ride, ride, ride!

Well, I had been talking about starting a blog … a training blog.  You see, my 20 year old daughter Nikki and I were training for a 100 mile Century Ride on the Eastern Shore of Maryland. We started our training in gyms on stationary bikes.  Being the fiscally responsible person that I am, I wasn’t willing to invest in all of the equipment until I was sure that we would like it.  Nikki was training at college and I was training between the YMCA and the trails in Plano on my mountain bike.  It was a very exciting day for both of us when we went out and finally bought our road bikes.  Nikki would ride a Trek bike and I’d be hitting the road on my Specialized.  How fun!  We started slow and were loving every second!  Quite honestly, Nikki was in far better cardio shape than her 47 year old mother, but after a couple of weeks I was keeping up!

There are many ways to customize your ride and Nikki was a little more enthusiastic than I was.  She was ready to put clipless pedals on her bike right away.  Me, on the other hand, I needed a little more time.  I was nervous about the clips so the box sat on the counter for over a month until the day I was ready to give it a try.  “Ride in a grass field at first to soften your fall,” was the great advice from a friend that I followed.  Yep, I fell.  I felt really stupid but worked through and found them quite easy to clip in and out of … until I fell – really hard!  That was the day this turned into a radial nerve injury blog ……

Off for a ride with Nikki

My road bike before clipless pedals