KK’s Live Healthy Journal: The Worst Bruise the World Has Ever Seen

This weekend, while walking the dogs on Saturday night with my friend, L., I tripped and completely wiped out on the street Not only did I skin my left knee badly and remove a layer of skin from a 3″ x 8″ swath of my right shin/calf, but I also banged my chin on the asphalt (though amazingly that was the least of the injuries and left a bruise but didn’t break the skin). It’s a good thing it happened so fast that I couldn’t even react to catch myself, because I surely would have broken at least one arm if not both. I owe it all to the fact that my right hip and thigh took the brunt of the impact. Hence, the worst bruise the world has ever seen:

Those pics were taken 24 hours after it happened. Initially it was black, and then it turned to purple. And do you see those weird dots of unbruised skin amid the bruise? Well, best I can figure, those are the spots where the pavement was pocked and I didn’t actually make contact with it. Kind of artistic. Still totally painful.

All I could think in the split second I was falling was, “No matter what happens, don’t let go of the leashes. For the love of God, don’t let go of the leashes.” And then I hit the ground and my friend screamed and I tried to figure out how I ended up on the ground and the dogs started licking me and L. ran over and took the dogs from me so I could pick myself up. Amusingly, I had fallen downhill, so getting up was a lot harder than it might sound. At first I thought I had broken my left kneecap because it hurt so much, but then the pain from the bruise kicked in and I figured that if my kneecap were actually broken, it would hurt more than my fat-protected areas. So that was a relief. Kind of.

Now, everything hurts. Walking hurts. Sitting hurts. Climbing stairs REALLY hurts. Just wearing pants hurts. It’s kind of putting a damper on my efforts to get more active. Insert pathetic whimper here.

Current weight: 126.7 lbs
Goal weight: 121 lbs

Contents © Copyright 2008 Kristen King

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