Endurance.Net Ridecamp Archives

Frank said:

> I've never been in a helicopter crash AFTER a very serious horse
> crash.  Therefore, I've never experienced the pain which someone
> on this list undoubtedly experienced while endurance riding in the
> southwest.
>
> I wonder if she'd share her experiences about recovery and returning
> to riding endurance, to the point where "drugging" herself to get
through
> an endurance ride is not required?
I got one dose of pain killer (Demerol) in the hospital three days after
the accident (which was immediately after the nose job), and I was on a
course of anti-biotics for 5 days after the accident in order to stave
off any infection from all the dirt that they had to clean out of my
face, but they were stopped a little early because they were making me
feverish and slightly delerious.  Ironically, they were continuing to
give me the antibiotics because I had a fever, but the fever stopped the
instant the antibiotics were stopped.  I have added Cipro to the list of
antibiotics that I don't have a favorable reaction to.

I had some substantial back pain (such that I couldn't sleep lying flat)
for about a month after that, and got a couple of massages in the weeks
following the accident to alleviate that, but mostly, I just didn't
sleep lying flat. Which was a bit hard since I spent the next ~month
sleeping 12-16 hours per day (I am told that this is a fairly normal
symptom of massive blood loss).

I have no recollection of any pain from the fractured liver (which is
what put me in the helicopter and in the hospital); although I
understand from some of the people who where there helping that I was
rather opinionated and unpleasant due to the pain that it caused while
being treated in the field, and I think remember Brent Johnson telling
me that he gave me some morphine after the helicopter crash and some
Valium to sedate me enough so that I wouldn't complain about being put
on the second helicopter (I do remember saying that, "No, no
helicopters, no, no, no."  And I must confess I haven't been on one
since, and they might STILL need to give me a couple of doses of Valium
to get me back on a helicopter, even if I didn't have a fractured
liver).

Because of the fractured liver (and the chance that reinjury would cause
additional and fatal internal bleeding), I did not ride for three months
after the accident, but it didn't cause me any pain, and I used no pain
killers during that time.  When Brent did the follow-up CAT scan and
"declared my liver healed" I stopped at the barn on the way home, in a
rain storm, and took my horse for a ride.  Which also didn't cause me
any pain, and the injury has never caused me any pain since. I do have
some (probably permanent) facial numbness because of the nerves that
were severed under my chin.

So, with respect to my accident, all the pain was gone before I was even
cleared to ride again.  And the only pain that I have any real memory of
is the back pain from being strapped to that damned C-spine board for
over 8 hours, through a helicopter crash and (I am told, other people
who were there have a better memory of it) riding in the back of a
pick-up truck for a few miles bumping down a dirt road on the Kaibab
Plateau.

Since leaving the hospital (almost six years ago), I have taken two
asprin when I got dumped off of Margie the Manic Pony, immediately, in
order to forestall any inflamation that would result; and two Ibuprofen
about three months ago when I tore the tendon in my pinky finger getting
my hands entangled in my horse's mane when he crashed into the 4'
Swedish oxer that was the second jump in a long one stride combination
that my horse tried to put two strides into. :)

It isn't that I haven't had any other mishaps since then--I have been
assaulted and punched in the head by a stranger in a home invasion, I
have been pitched into steel fence at the full gallop by a horse that
didn't quite make the turn, I have been dumped on a log fence in the
middle of a water element on a cross country course, I have been flipped
over on by the Wicked Witch of the West...to name but a few.

I am fully aware that I appear to have a much higher tolerance for pain
than some people appear to, and that I appear to be able to come through
most mishaps virtually unscathed (Grand Canyon experience
notwithstanding).  I suspect that this has less to do with youth (I am
not as young as some of the people here seem to think I am) and more to
do with genetics which would give me more "natural ability" than others.

Personally, I do not think it inappropriate for endurance riders to
compete with pharmacological assistance and I don't think that the AERC
should have a rule against it, but then, I think, I don't think it
inappropriate for professional baseball players to do so either.  It
actually seems to me that there might be MORE justification for allowing
individuals to use whatever pharmacological assistance they can to earn
a living than just so they can entertain themselves with an extreme
hobby.

> From what I am hearing, the reason the AERC allows the use of
performance enhancing drugs for riders but not for horses has nothing to
do with the athletes needing to compete on their own "natural ability"
but rather because horses cannot give informed consent.  The use of
drugs on either horse or rider has the both the chance of changing the
outcome of the event and the chance of causing irreparable damage to the
drugged party (and both horses and riders could, arguably, be better off
for their judicious use).

However, what it all really comes down to is that the ethical use of
drugs, for any athlete, is not as cut and dried as some people would
like to think.

I have no problem with endurance riders using performance enhancing
drugs to get through a ride, just so long as they admit that that is
what they are doing.  I can decide for myself if I want to drug myself
in order to be able to continue to compete with them...if it ever comes
to that.

kat
Orange County, Calif.



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