Part 1
On Tuesday, December 23rd, 2025, I decided to go on a quick morning bike ride around White Rock Lake. Both my normal morning ride friends had bailed that morning, but I knew outside exercise would improve my day, mostly from a mental standpoint but also physically. I couldn’t have been more wrong.
When meeting friends I take a certain route in order to meet them at a certain location, “T&P Hill”, but when solo I take a slightly different route to the main road around the lake.
I noticed right away that the ground was wet. It hadn’t rained, the dew point just produced a layer of dampness. I topped off my rear tire anyway. In hindsight, this was a tactical error.
I was careful around the treacherous turns early in the route. But while executing a slow turn, one I’ve done 100 times in the past, I suddenly found myself slamming against the ground. There was no warning, no stumbling, just instant and violent connection with the ground.
The scene of the crime
I knew it was bad. 3 other cyclists witnessed my crash and helped pull the bike out from between my legs. I’d also swung 180 degrees. I landed on my right side but after they moved the bike I rolled over onto my left side and asked they just give me a minute to compose myself.
After a minute I realized I still could not move my right leg and that this simple crash resulted in more serious damage than I first thought.
Another nice cyclist rolled up and helped me get my phone out of my jersey pocket. I called Carissa, who answered on the first ring despite it being 7am on a non-school day. I told her I’d crashed and needed to be picked up.
Quite a few minutes later and I began to come to the realization that I was going to need EMS help to move. I was just about to call 911 when two bicycle police officers rolled up and immediately called for an ambulance. This situation was really shitty, but their timing was fortuitous—no explaining the a 911 operator what had happened and where I was. The ambulance arrived before Carissa did—I was up on a bike trail inaccessible by civilian cars. She ran up the trail right as they were lifting me into the wagon.
In the ambulance I started to go into shock.
Hours passed in the ER, and movement required by the CAT scan and x-rays were occasions for the worst pain I have ever experienced in my life.
Hours later I was informed I had an acetabular fracture, commonly known as a hip socket fracture. The ball of the femur had slammed into the socket so forcefully that it fractured the hip. Surgery was planned for the next day. I was moved into a room.
Surgery happened the afternoon of Christmas Eve. I now have a stainless steel screw in my hip, very close to the socket.
The hardware
Part 2
Christmas in the hospital
The four days immediately post-op were bad but manageable. I celebrated Christmas from my hospital room via FaceTime. I had a session with the occupational therapist to teach me how to move around without putting weight on the leg and got home late on Christmas.
The week and a half following was hell. I don’t really have it in me to relive it in writing, but I did manage to complain on Mastodon throughout:
Friday, Dec 26
Last night was rough. Wish I had stayed in the hospital at least another night.
Saturday, Dec 27
MFW I want another painkiller and realize I’m already on one the most powerful OTC painkillers and it’s another 2.5 hours before I can take another one.
Sunday, Dec 28
Slept through the night last night and took a seated and assisted shower today. But in terms of pain and mobility not better today. The amount of moving/pain involved with the shower might have set me back.
Monday, Dec 29
Five days post op, 1:40pm, up since 8am, I was just able to move from bed to chair. I sure hope this is a it’s darkest before the dawn situation.
Tuesday, Dec 30
Got darker still. No appropriate emoji. Very focused on basic functions and pain control. Haven’t moved from bedroom since Sunday.
Wednesday (NYE) to Saturday, January 3rd, it continued to get worse, or at least, if you were an extremely optimistic person, failed to get any better. Except for the day before surgery, these were days of the worst pain I’ve ever experienced. On two nights, I thought we were going to have to go back to the hospital (for both my sake and Carissa’s). On one of those, I started to go into shock.
Sunday, January 4
Last night I discovered my breaking point. 12 days of near constant pain, often intense enough to require focused breathing to avoid going into shock.
I feel I am a broken man. I will talk, captor.
Monday, January 5
Made it to my follow up dr appt. That was a lot of movement so we will see how the rest of today goes. The doctors keep moving the goal posts on when the pain will start to go away, now it’s week three (next week). Prescribed Yet Another Pain Medication.
Tuesday, January 6
14 days since my freak bike crash where I broke my hip. 14 days of almost continuous pain. 14 days sleeping sitting upright. In 14 days, I have been outside twice, once to come home from hospital and once to go to follow up doctor appointment. 14 days of being almost entirely unable to do anything productive.
14 days, 7 different pain meds.
January 7th, I was able to work a full day for the first time.
I’ve left out some of the more horrible details of that week from hell.
I’m now able to wheel myself around downstairs on my office chair and get up and down from chairs, beds, and toilets by myself. I’m not allowed to put weight on the leg for another four weeks.
I haven’t had time to mourn what will be the functional death of what was one of most central aspects of my existence, and the thing that kept me sane amidst [waves hands around]. But I don’t imagine I will be riding a bike in remotely the same way I did. This is not worth it. Hell, I’m going to be increasingly paranoid about walking as I age into actual hip-break age range.
I hadn’t crashed since the 1990’s, when I raced. Maybe I’d saved up a dozen normal crashes and spent all that karma on this one.