
Long story short, I broke my back sledding with the kids on Christmas break.
Wait, it’s not actually that bad. My initial terror was “oh my god, I’m going to be paralyzed for the rest of my life!” and that turns out to not be true, so trust me that anything else is not so bad. A few months of convalescence while things heal… could be a lot worse!
Vertebrae don’t break like regular bones, they crush. Given time and sufficient rest, it will heal, but I will never regain that 3 mm of height. In the meantime, 2-3 months of no lifting anything, no bending, no twisting, no impacts. Any sort of compressive shock to the spine right now would be extremely bad and could restart my recovery (at best) to lead to something much much worse. No running, no skiing, no anything with a risk of falling. Oh great.
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