Choose your own adventure, the aftermath.

Upon stepping out of the hospital, no neck brace or lame foot could keep me from hopping on a bike again! (Mainly due to the fact that there weren't any taxi's in the area to take me to the train station). This daring act may seem to you like stupidity, but I disagree. See, I rode on the back of Tim's bike this time. (I'd insert a "so there!" right here, but that would seem a bit immature, ...so I won't). He slowly made his way around the small city to the train station, and I painfully hobbled my way onto the train back to Barcelona.

I spent my last few hours in the city either hanging on someone's arm while hobbling along, being carried piggy back across the city (embarrassing), or with my foot elevated. Sunday morning I called a friend of mine from Amsterdam to see if she could pick me up from the airport that evening, since I wouldn't have been able to make it home with my luggage on my own. I didn't give her very many details, so rumors flew around church after she had told a few people, and in the end one person was overheard saying: "Oh, yeah... Claire got in a serious accident in Barcelona, she can't even walk anymore. Someone's flying down there now to bring her back home."

Tim ended up escorting me to the airport after having one last little visit in the city. Once we made it to the check-in terminal, he suggested I get a wheelchair. I'm assuming my look said it all, since he replied, "Claire, you're never going to see any of these people again... just take the wheelchair!" So, I obliged. Once the wheelchair came I said goodbye to Tim and was wheeled over to my gate. I sat in a normal chair, with the wheelchair beside me, while waiting for the plane to arrive - and I felt like I was handling the whole 'wheelchair' thing quite well. When it was time to board I was wheeled over to the door of the gate while the other passengers were starting to line up - and I still had the 'wheelchair' thing under control. But no more than 10 seconds later, a little old lady was wheeled over and placed right in front of me! Oh how I wanted to laugh. What pathetic site I must have been. Unfortunately the wheelchairs weren't the type which allows the rider to push themselves, otherwise I'd have asked her if she wanted to race down the platform to the airplane.

I stayed cooped up in my apartment for the first 3 days after arriving back to Amsterdam since my foot swelled to the size of an elephant and no longer fit in any of my shoes. I was told by my house doctor, who didn't even look at my injuries, to go to physical therapy. So I did. That first visit, my PT told me to get crutches and he worked on my neck. He was unable to work on my foot due to it's size. I went back two days later when the swelling had gone down a bit more (by then it had been a week since the accident), and he determined that my joints had been compacted. He said it'd take a few weeks for my foot to get back to normal.
Well, a few weeks have reached 4. The swelling has gone down - almost completely, the bruising is almost gone and I no longer use my crutches. That said, my foot is numb from my big toe down the right side of my foot to the joint, I'm not able to apply pressure to the ball of my foot near the last three toes, I'm not able to curl my toes very well, nor am I able to turn my foot due to the tightness right below my ankle. Which means, I walk with a limp. I feel like I should wear baggy pants that hang half way down my butt, so that my limp will look more like I'm just pimpin'. At least that way I'd look 'cool'.

The End.

There is a moral to this story though: A) listen to the voices of reason, and B) don't ride on the back of a motorcycle with a boy.