Monday, June 24, 2013

Workout Blues

Fun fact about me, I HATE working out. Yeah I played some sports in high school and I've always been decently active, but actually working out? There is absolutely no love. I hate every single part of it. Starting out, that middle bit where you feel like you're about to puke your brains out and die, the sweating, I hate it all. Well, I like one part. The part where you get to stop working out is my favorite. On the real, thank goodness for good genetics because with my eating and workout habits I should weigh about 300 lbs. Yeah, I know its good for my health, but so are avocados and I hate them too.

Umm....super cool Hannah, but what was the point of that little rant against a healthy lifestyle? Well, I am so bored because of all the restrictions on my knee that all I want to do is workout. Whaaaaa?  Yeah that's right. Its all I can think about. I want to surf, I want to hike, I want to run. You heard right, Hannah wants to run. I just want to take off and sprint up Koko Head, or even just run down the street. I'm not even allowed to swim (kicking is a big no-no) or just sit on a paddle board and doodle around (I asked my physical therapist today. Too much of a risk of tweaking the knee if.....when....I fall off).

Two more months and then I'll at least be cleared to run. Until then, the most I get to workout is physical therapy. I got add squats and stepping up onto a stool today. Woooooooooooooo.


What I would like to be doing. 



What I'm actually doing. 



Wednesday, June 19, 2013

Monster effort.

I am in a not so great mood right now, so here's a list of things that I have going for me. I'm hoping to pull some Psych 101 magic and make myself feel better.

* I have my health. Yeah knee surgery is a bitch, but there are people out there a lot worse off than me. I could have hit my head and given myself brain damage, I could have lost the leg, I could have cancer.....there are a lot worse things that could have happened to me.

* I have wonderful family and friends who are willing to help me out when I need it. I could be facing this business alone, and that would have been super duper shitty.

* I'm pretty. Yeah its vain, but whatever. I'm trying to make myself feel better. So hooray for being pretty.

I can't think of anything else and this really didn't help me very much, but hey. At least I tried. This monster thinks I did a good job.



Tuesday, June 18, 2013

Well that's just fine.

Big things are happening in the life of Hannah. You ready?

1. Hot damn, I KILLED it in physical therapy today. I used the exercise bike for about 5 minutes. It sounds super lame, but I felt so badass, especially since it took me a little bit to even get my leg to make a full revolution. Once I finished up on the bike, I moved on to the normal leg exercises, and Kevin my physical therapist was super impressed with how well I could straighten my leg and how much I could flex my quad (I know, I know.........I'm pretty much the cat's pajamas). Plus the view from the exercise bike was pretty. If you're going to rehab an injury, I guess paradise is the place to do it.

It really doesn't sound like a huge deal, but I have been busting my ass since my last appointment, making sure that I do all the exercises that I'm supposed to do at home, and it was cool to see that I am actually making progress. This is especially nice since the workouts are SO. FREAKING. MONOTONOUS. Holy crap. Straighten the leg with weights, stretch with the band (straight and bent knee), quad stretches, leg lifts (front, side back), lather rinse and repeat. But they're clearly working, so I just gotta keep on keepin' on.

2. I went ALL DAY without my crutches! Whaaaaaaaaaaaat. I still have a lot of work to do when it comes to walking (walk with a limp like an old school pimp a real O.GEEEEEE.....anyone? Anyone??) but it was so satisfying to blend in with the crowd. Society is so focused on standing out, but I can't even express how much I just want to feel invisible for a bit. Today was glorious. No pity looks, no questions, nothing. SO. WONDERFUL. I'm sore as shit and my hip hurts like a bitch, but it was totally worth it. AAAAHHHH words can't even express how stoked I am. No brace, no crutches, just a normal girl cruising around minding her own business. LOVE IT. 

3. I got a part-time job at a coffee shop downtown. I start in a couple weeks. Its not much, but it'll be nice to have some sort of income while I look for something else. Hooray!

4. I got a free drink from Starbucks today. Win.

All in all, I am a super sore but happy panda. :)


Made this bike my bitch today. Not a big deal. 

Sunday, June 16, 2013

Blue hair, don't care.

Oh my goodness, I was not a happy panda in that last post! But today was 10000x times better, and I am the happiest fish in the sea. Well, I guess that might be a little extreme, but it seemed good to stick with the animal thing. ANYWAY.

Today my KBFF (kayak best friend forever, keep up) Hailey and I went to Sandy Beach Park, and it was way too much fun. Pro tip: if you ever come to Oahu, make sure you spend a day here. The beach is beautiful, its on a beautiful part of the island, and the people are beautiful. Hot damn, there are some hotties at Sandy's. Pro tip #2: if you do go to this beach, be super super careful. The lifeguard was telling us how its the number one beach for neck and back breaks because the waves are so big.Yikes. There are some mad body boarders there, and they're really fun to watch.

Speaking of body boarding, I wish I could have gotten pictures, because some of these guys were absolutely ridiculous. There were the standard people with their regular boards who were pretty talented and entertaining to watch, but there were some slightly less conventional ones as well. There was one guy who tried to body board with a pool floaty, and he was not successful. The floaty got some serious air though and he never gave up, so props to that guy. There was also a kid (maybe 12) who was using a tray as a body board. Like stolen from a school cafeteria tray. He was doing pretty solid for a bit, but then the ocean claimed the tray as its own. And we saw a monk seal, which was rad.

My leg actually felt really strong when I was on the beach. I don't have to wear my brace anymore, and I didn't use my crutches (duh. Could you imagine crutches in the sand? Not a good look.) and it was so so so wonderful not having anyone staring at my leg. I was limping a little bit and the muscle atrophy in my leg is pretty significant, but nobody cared. It sounds weird, but it was amazing.

Then Hailey and I went back to her house and I dyed part of my hair blue, because why the hell not?


Technically this picture is from a couple of days ago, but its still Sandy's so whatever. Notice how normal the leg looks.


My new monk seal friend. He was just posted on the beach like he didn't have a care in the world. Which he doesn't, because he's a monk seal. 


Before and after. The blue is kind of hard to see, but I promise its there! I think I might add some more to it. 







Saturday, June 15, 2013

5:14 AM




Oh good morning everyone. Its 5:14 on this lovely Hawaiian morning, and I hate everything. I woke up at 2:30 (maybe? I don't know. It was fucking early) because my stupid leg hurts. A lot. Like I feel like someone stabbed me right below the kneecap. Super. I tried to fight the pain with a combination of Arrested Development, Advil and ice, but that didn't work. The problem? Normally I sleep on my stomach, but all I can do with my leg is sleep on my back.

I realize that in the grand scheme of my life this is just a little blip, but right now its almost 5:30 in the morning, I'm watching Cake Boss and I want to punch myself in the face. So that's neat.


Friday, June 14, 2013

Things I learned from being hurt Vol. 1

WARNING: This post is mostly me bitching about stuff. Volume 2 (if it ever happens) might be good things that I learned, but this is not that list. Shall we?

1. Things you can't do with a busted knee: hike, surf, paddle board, beach volleyball, soccer, running, basically any sort of fun physical activity. Things you can do with a busted knee: physical therapy, sitting on the beach, sitting on a paddle board, video games, drink. Notice how those lists don't exactly match up? Yeah Hawaii is not awesome when you're hurt. Nobody comes here with the strong desire to stay inside all day. And you can only play Super Mario for so long before you actually start to think that you're Mario.

2. People are nosy when it comes to injuries. I understand that humans are inherently curious, and we all have that desire to slow down and stare when we drive past a car accident. Unfortunately for me, in this situation I'm the car accident, and everybody here has this inherent need to slow down and stare. Everyone wants to know what I did, how I did it, and if I have medical insurance. Yeah, that's a thing. Is it normal for people to ask questions like that?! Take it from me, unless you are offering to pay that person's medical bills if they don't have insurance, don't ask about it. Its none of your business, and its sort of offensive. Also, nobody wants to hear your injury stories, and the pity looks just make me want to punch you in the face. Sorry, I'm  done with my rant now.

3. I don't like being helped. I always knew that I was independent, but my knee has taught me that I might be independent to a fault. I have had people offer to carry things upstairs for me, offer me an arm to help me balance, pick things up when I drop them, carry me into the water, and I have even had multiple people offer to carry me upstairs. This is all well and good and I realize that they are doing this out of the goodness of their hearts, but I HATE it. So much. The only time that I've actually accepted the help was the time at Dave & Buster's when I had to take the stairs and my knee hurt so badly I thought I was going to pass out. Even then, I was not very nice to the person who helped me. (If you're reading this, I'm really sorry. I was a huge bitch and you didn't deserve it). It is something that I am trying to work on.

4. People can be creepy, but I have to give them points on being creative. I have had some of the most bizarre pickup lines because of my knee. My absolute favorites? "Oh girl, you wanna play doctor? I bet I can get that knee to bend." and "Hey have you met my friend? He's got a bum knee and a bum wrist, but his dick still works! You guys could have cute, gimpy babies!" Its been pretty entertaining. I also appreciated the man who told me that my knee brace "made my dress look good". I'm not 100% sure what that means, but I'm assuming its a compliment. Oh! And there was a guy who took pictures of my brace because the stickers on it were "artistic". I don' know when Batman and whales started being art, but then again, I'm pretty sure someone shit in a jar and sold that as art, so there you go.

5. The beach and the ocean always make me feel better. Despite the fact that I had a billion pounds of sand in my brace which totally messed up the velcro situation, sitting on the beach is incredibly cathartic. I highly recommend it to anyone who has anything on their minds. Plus sometimes you see a sea turtle, and that is just wonderful. Also cupcakes. Sitting on the beach and eating a cupcake might be the best thing ever.



Well........hello.

So, I moved to Hawaii in September. I didn't really have a good reason to, I graduated from school and couldn't think of anything better to do, so when a friend called me and asked if I wanted to move out here with her, I jumped at the chance. (Wouldn't you?) I went into the move with pretty lofty expectations. I was going to find a kick ass job that allowed for maximum beach time, find a kick ass apartment (right by the beach, duh), meet a kick ass guy (preferably a professional surfer/famous person), and basically just have the all around most kick ass time ever. I blame these expectations on the viewing of too many Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen movies as a child. They were always having fabulous adventures with hotties. Remember that time they went to Paris?

So what actually happened? I bought a moped, named it White Lightning, and then crashed that bad boy straight into the ground at the end of February. One slam to the asphalt of King street, two urgent care visits, a few x-rays, and one MRI later, my Olsen twin dreams were shattered by the news that I had a bruised rib, a blown out ACL and a torn meniscus. Whoops. My biggest worry went from "hmmm.....do I want to go to the beach today?" to "hmmm.......do I want to get knee surgery in Hawaii or in Arizona?" Awesome.

To those who know me, this honestly doesn't come as any sort of surprise. To put it mildly, I fall down a lot. My entire life, I've been the girl who's always hurt. To name a few of my mishaps, one time I fell through a stage, I broke my foot in 6 places falling down some stairs (well, technically I fell into a trap-door basement, but we've all heard that story before), I once gave myself a black eye while painting my own toenails, and a friend recently told me that the first time he met me I fell down some stairs at a party. Oh, and I also got a bruise on the back of my leg that was approximately the size of Texas trying to climb the fence to sneak out of the Royal Hawaiian hot tub.

Anywho, after two months of being in possibly the hottest knee brace known to man-kind, getting hit on by some serious creepers (hey girl, you wanna play doctor?), and lying shamelessly about how I got my injury (basketball, volleyball, surfing, shark bite, car accident, you name it, I probably said it with a smile on my face) I went back to the lovely state of Arizona and got myself a brand spankin' new ACL. Which brings us to right now. I'm about 3 weeks (?? I'm too lazy to figure it out exactly) out of surgery,  back in Hawaii, just started physical therapy, have no job and am not allowed to do any sort of physical activity, so I have decided to chronicle the recovery process in the blog, because why the hell not? Weird stuff happens to me on the regular, so hopefully it'll be an entertaining read. And if not? Well.........I don't really know what to tell you.


Yokohama beach. To show that I really live in Hawaii, I guess. I don't know. 

Night Fury, my super kick ass brace that I don't have to wear anymore. 


The knee. Post surgery. Gross, eh?