Skaters that Persevere

[BH]

In 2005 I got rear ended in a car accident and had  injured two vertebrae and didn’t really realize it at the time.  Was sore but able to skate in a week or so. Couple weeks later, got drunk and fell off a bar stool flat on my back and really damaged the vertebrae. Despite being blacked out I couldn’t fall asleep because of the pain. The next morning my ankles were tingling and were numb by mid day, and the tingling was rising to my waist. I should’ve immediately gone to the hospital but I’m an idiot and rode it out one more sleepless night.  I could not walk and was paralyzed from the upper thigh down. When I couldn’t feel my dick I called my step mother and I got an MRI and xrays, two broken vertebrae and a blood clot compressing my spinal chord.  I had emergency surgery followed by two months of physical therapy, much of which was in-patient. I had to relearn how to walk. Basically the signals from my brain to my legs needed to be reprogrammed, it was hell. It took a few weeks to learn to walk up and down steps. After about a year I was good as far as function but still had back pain.
When I was cleared to skate again, I had to relearn everything. It wasn’t like being rusty, it was like I had never skated. But mentally I knew what to do so that helped speed up the process. I was also afraid of hurting my back again. In about a year I got all my tricks back and was as good as before, except I lost ollieing over big stuff, and I didn’t jump down stuff.  I had never had that much time off the board in 15 years and started to drink a lot more. So when I finally got everything back and was comfortable, I was like, welp, that’s it. My skating ended up being in the way of my drinking. In a couple years I was a full blown alcoholic and addict. I got sober in 2017 and picked back up late last year, but just left rehab a couple weeks ago. I want to skate again and bought a Jake Rupp The Killing Floor guest board! Things are great in my life now and will roll around when I have free time.  I rarely think about my back these days and go to the gym to keep it strong. Thanks for reading

[Francis Xavier]

Props to all of you for not stopping! Tons of respect.

I myself was diagnosed with stage 2/3 colorectal cancer a few years back, did the normal chemo/radiation treatment.

During my second round of chemo I developed neuropathy in my hands and feet. Most of it was due to it being fall/winter and everything is cold,I literally had to wear gloves to grab things out of the fridge, otherwise my hand would numb right up (it's like that sitting-on-the-toilet-too-long feeling) and I couldn't drink anything iced or my throat would swell up and feel like it straight filled with blisters. I also constantly wore socks and slippers to avoid not being able to feel my feet.

 Once treatment ended my hands weren't an issue, and after a month I could have iced beverages and cold food in general. My feet were the fucking issue,and after nearly a year of not being able to skate because of being attached to a chemo pump, having an ileostomy,and recovering from the reversal of the ileostomy...I was eager to get back on board.

Up until recently I couldn't feel my feet, they felt numb, and it was the neuropathy. My nerves were all fucked up from the chemo I had, and my understanding is that since our feet have all the nerve endings, basically that shit was being filtered out of my body. It was a fucked side effect,but I tried to skate and it felt like someone cut of my ankles and had me push.

I couldn't ollie and my balance was shit, because I couldn't figure out my weight distribution. Some days were better than others,  because after about an hour of skating I'd actually feel a little tingle. I did all sorts of hippie shit to try and alleviate it,but nothing worked. My oncologist said it could go away in a month or it could stay forever. Fuck,ok guess I'll relearn how to skate.

What ended up happening in the last few years is that it slowly went away,the best was when it was just my toes that were affected and every months I got more feeling. I'm still relearning, can't get out and skate everyday anymore,but at least I can feel my feet and it's not as weird. There were days I'd wake up and have good feeling in my feet,thinking it was gone and then I stepped on my floor and it instantly came back.

It's not so much of a struggle now,but I do feel for all you pals because I know the feeling of restriction and the bulllshit that comes along with it. It's sort of a bitch to explain it all with minimal details and writing an essay, but I tried haha