not what i intended....

it happens mostly every trip.

i assume it was just my time to take one for the team.

but ending up here wasn't exactly what i had planned for the evening.

let me just say, my family is notorious for spending a few hours with doctors over vacations. broken arms, broken wrists, a torn acl & broken ribs are just a few of our many incidents.

most of them are associated with snow skiing; but then again, as long as we're doing some kind of a sport, anything is possible.

earlier this spring, my family decided to vacation at hilton head island. it's our 2nd trip to this south carolina island; and we love it. there's so much to do-fishing, shopping, going to the beach, playing golf, riding bikes, and just relaxing...it doesn't get much better than this.

on tuesday night, we were especially looking forward to a fireworks show. it was just a mile or so away from our house to the harbor of shelter cove to see the fireworks at dusk.

at dinner, mom mentioned that it was going to be hard to find parking at shelter cove, so my brother-in-law (michael) said that he would ride a bike there with my nephew (mason) in the baby seat. i volunteered to go on another bike and mom said she would ride also. my dad, pregnant sister, and aunt were going to ride in one of our cars.

any chance to ride a bike, i'll jump at the opportunity. in fact, i mentioned last week that for my birthday, it would be fun to get a bike....little did i know what was ahead of me...

so we started out. michael and mason were in front of me and mom behind me.

about 1/4 of the way there, i decided to go in reverse with my pedals (thinking back to my old bike where the brakes were on the handlebars and you could do this).

definitely not the smartest move.

on these bikes reversing the pedals makes the bike stop.

my bike stopped....i didn't.

the next thing i knew i was on the ground.

my mom stopped quickly behind me asking if i was alright.

all i remember saying to her is, "i think i better skip the fireworks tonight."

i slowly rose to my feet and looked down.

and there it was. blood began to pour out of my right knee/leg.

i couldn't cry...i think i was too shocked to cry. who falls off of a bike at 27? the last time i fell off a bike was when i was in the 1st grade.

suddenly my sister (jenn) ran up to me (fortunately, the car with my dad, sister, & aunt got a chance to view my graceful show from afar) and stopped the car a block ahead of us.

jenn got on my bike and told me to go get in the car.

i got in the car with my dad driving and my aunt janelle in the back seat. dad turned the car around and headed back for the house.

when we got back to the house, blood was all over my leg.

don't pass out...don't pass out...don't pass out....

my aunt reminded me that's what our family is also famous for -we tend to pass out in situations like this.

we put my leg in the bathtub and washed the wound off with water, but blood kept coming out. we added pressure to stop the bleeding, but that didn't seem to help much either. not to mention, we didn't have anything to clean the wound with. so my sweet dad volunteered to go pick up antiseptic at the store for me while janelle iced my knee.

5 minutes later, dad was back.

he had spoken to the security guard at the entrance of our resort and the officer suggested we go to the emergency care clinic which was about 1/2 a mile away. dad, janelle and i all loaded up into the car and drove...and drove...and drove...

no luck.

we found a general store where we were informed the emergency care clinic had shut down. seriously? the register at the general store suggested we go to hilton head hospital about 6 lights south of our resort.

actually, 8 lights down from our resort, we finally arrived at the hospital.

we walked into the emergency room where they asked me a million questions about my health, what medicine i take daily, and so forth. i mentioned i took flintstone vitamins everyday...it gave all the staff a good laugh. hey, don't knock it, until you try it....

the registered nurse (we'll call him gaylord focker) wheeled me into a room with my aunt and dad following me behind. how appropriate we had a camera, huh?

gaylord and another nurse (yolanda) began to get out sponges and medicine to clean my knee.

i asked janelle if she would come and hold my hand knowing that this wasn't going to be pleasant.

gaylord piped in and said "i'll hold your hand" and grabbed my hand.

i know that sounds nice, but holding gaylord's hand was the last thing that i wanted to be doing...or 2nd to last thing.

luckily, janelle saw the look on my face and she made her way over to me.

cleaning out my knee certainly wasn't fun...but i survived.

then the doctor came in.

"hi, i'm dr. snowman".

don't laugh, just say your name, i thought to myself.

"hey, i'm alison"

as he examined my leg, he mentioned that my fall took off quite a bit of skin and i have a nasty road burn. "frosty" went into the medical lingo on skin layers and how most of mine came off during my fall (which unfortunately included my tan too...).

during the middle of our conversation, his phone rang.

he picked up the phone and said, "snowman".

yes, you read that right.

at this point, i couldn't even look at my dad or aunt because i knew that i'd just start laughing.

once "frosty" hung up from his call, he mentioned that it would be best for me to stay out of the water (are you kidding, i'm at the beach?!) and gave me directions on medicine and other information.

then he shook my hand and dad's hand and headed out the door.

as soon as "frosty" left, the first thing out of janelle's mouth was, "do you think reindeer was on the phone for him?" ha!

dad, as usual, made friends with all the hospital staff and took care of filling out paperwork. so sweet.

after yolanda gave me a tetanus shot; we headed home.

it was an eventful evening for sure.

i had planned on going paddleboarding with michael at hilton head, but since i can't get into the water that was out of the question...so a trip to the e.r. is it for this month. it was definitely a first for me.

now about that bike for my birthday, i'm thinking it may need training wheels. :)

love,

alison