Both Feet Non-Weight Bearing [2-3 months] Recovery/Strength/Psych Advice?

I had a nasty 60ft whip almost 2 weeks ago that pulled a couple pieces of gear and shattered both of my feet on a ledge. My left foot had four dislocated tarsal/metatarsal joints and I am recovering well from a surgery that put in 2 steel plates and 2 temporary pins. Tomorrow, I go in for surgery on my right foot. This surgery will attempt to restructure my heel, which was fractured and broken in many places.

Only 2 weeks into a non-mobile life and I already feel my body getting weaker. As I type, I have a strong urge to move/train, but I have never been in a situation like this before and don't know where to start. I want something to strive towards so that when I do fully recover from this injury, I can be as close to my previous shape as possible.

I know that a good support system helps tremendously, and while I currently have that, my parents will have to return home next week, leaving me in the northeast alone until the end of summer. I'm worried that I will have difficulties keeping up the psych while managing this difficult situation.

I'd like to hear from others that have experiences surrounding situations like mine. I'm not looking for a cure-all and not looking for hand-outs. I would just really like to hear about other situations like mine and how you made it through.

-Battles

I have personally never been through anything nearly as bad, but you might find some comfort, parallel thoughts, and possible ways forward in Steph Abegg's recovery blog. She's a total crusher who nearly lost a leg in pursuit of alpinism.

http://www.stephabegg.com/home/tripreports/washington/northcascades/vesper
http://www.stephabegg.com/home/tripreports/recovery 

The Sharp End podcast is another source of inspiration when the fun hits Level 3 and beyond.
https://americanalpineclub.org/sharp-end-podcast/

Good luck with your recovery. Can't imagine what you're going through.

That's a terrible accident.  I'm sorry for what happened to you.  I wish you a full recovery.
While I've never had an injury as severe as yours, I've had plenty of injuries and plenty of downtime.  
What I learned is to take every injury as an positive opportunity to do something else.  There is plenty of crosstraining you can do with two non-weightbearing legs.  As soon as your surgeons clear you for PT, get in there and query them about every type of exercise you can do that will not cause difficulty with your recovery. In general, the more you can keep your blood moving, the faster you will heal.
When I had two severely sprained ankles once, I did a lot of stretching, core and upper body weight training.
One of my injuries once was a broken wrist with my arm in a cast for three months.  I did a lot of great aerobics in that time.
Core exercises always benefit your climbing.  You could become a core maniac in that time frame.
Ask if you can do the row machine - that's great aerobic training that I think you can probably do if you're feet are in a cast or boot (but check with PT about this).

Lastly, climbing is my passion too, but there are plenty of other things that make life worth living.  Have you ever wanted to learn another language?  Learn a musical instrument or art form?  Whatever has an interest for you that you never had time for before because of the time spent climbing, try!
Good luck with your recovery.
Phyl

Bryan... so sorry to hear about your accident, it sucks but it’s all part of the game.

Some great advice already listed above. The only thing I will add is this: Keep a good attitude, long hours of painful PT can bring you down. Consider this situation you are in now and work hard to fix yourself... what you have is not permanent.

Best of luck to you

See the entire experience as a challenge.  Sure there are some limbs you might not be able to use but don't let that stop you from getting out and living your life as close as possible to the way you use to.

While I've never had as bad injuries I have had numerous less serious breaks.  I often ended up being MORE active.  On direct tip, if you do end up with enough weigh bearing capability for crutches get PROPER crutches.  Don't get the ones under your armpits, they are almost useless.  Get forearm crutches.  You can move at a fast speed on these.

I met a guy a month or two ago who was in an accident during work.  Shattered both his legs, I think his back and his lower leg was amputated.  He was back outside with a prosthetic climbing shoe 6 months after the accident.

Ahhh man, such a bummer. I'm sorry to hear about your fall. I don't know what happened, but it sounds like a pretty great outcome for a 60 footer!

I had something similar-ish in that I was out for a long while. This probably isn't what you want to hear, but you will get weak, and that's okay. It's cool that your arms are okay and you can find a way to train those -- I had this fantasy of training fingers exclusively while my legs were non-weight bearing and coming back and campusing the world (unfortunately, I also had a non-weight bearing arm).

But honestly, getting weak doesn't have to be a bad thing. Not sure where you're at in your climbing career, but for me, losing all my strength was a catalyst for realizing that there are a million different amazing things in the world that aren't climbing. I guess it takes away that performance tunnel vision. That doesn't have to be the case for you. You can and will come back if that's what you decide (what are feet good for in climbing anyway?). But I definitely encourage you to keep an open mind to the infinite possibilities that life provides.

No matter what you decide to do in the long term, in the short term, just stay busy. Unless you're superhuman, it can be pretty easy to get down in this type of situation. If you can't work, make a list of goals that aren't climbing related. Go to school online, learn to juggle, write more, learn an instrument, get a Rubix cube, whatever. Just don't spend all day looking at the ceiling (or facestagram).

This is annoying but true: being injured is a unique and amazing life experience that you'd never make on your own.

Thanks to everyone who replied to this thread, your responses really helped me through the rough time in the hospital. Today is 5 weeks from my injury. I head back to the Midwest tomorrow to get ready for my last year of school. I was able to remain here and finish out my internship, something that was very important to me. In 2 weeks I'll be cleared to start weight bearing with a boot on my left foot. I still have 2 months to go before partial weight bearing on my right foot, which now has a plate and 12 screws in the heel, but by then I'll be wearing a shoe on my left! I expect to make a full recovery and be back climbing as soon as I can make it to the wall.

To anyone reading this who might have similar injuries: Don't let anyone tell you what you can and can't do. They're not you and they don't know what you're capable of. This is a long hard road, but there's nothing stopping you from doing everything you want to do. My first surgeon told me I was stupid to want to stay here and finish my internship. He told me I should go back home where my parents could take care of me. I politely told him to F off. He was wrong, and I made it a point to prove that to myself.

I'm thankful to be alive and grateful that I will walk again one day. Craig, you really put it best. This has been one incredible life experience. In some way, I'm glad I've been able to experience this and see life from a new perspective. Not many people get to experience life without the use of their legs. It's knowledge and empathy I'll carry with me for the rest of my life and be a better man for it.

Whoa man. Sorry to hear about your fall.

Advice on keeping the stoke going: listen to all the episodes of The Enormocast...in order...back to back...all day...every day.

Craig Demartino episode is particularly relevant to your situation.

Speedy healing.

Second on the Craig Demartino podcast. I listened to that thing over and over again when I was in the hospital from a climbing fall.

Another podcast that may offer some guidance or inspiration: trainingbeta.com/media/alex…

Ah man, I hate to hear that. Hopefully you were able to avoid any surgeries!

The last 3 weeks have been a wild ride. I moved into the second floor room of my new house and have had a fun time crawling up/down the stairs and learning to do things without a wheelchair upstairs (I use a skateboard). I've been able to convince a friend to take me to the gym most mornings where I use every machine I can, which is inevitably a lot of upper body. This week I started using rock rings to train fingers and I was even able to find a hand-bike to use for some cardio! Oh, and today was my first day of classes.

What got me through the last 2 months the most has been having something to work towards every day. Having both of my legs in casts but having so much motivation to get better was extremely frustrating. Like you told me before, have long term goals. I thought, why not work on a six pack for X-mas? I started doing daily core workouts from my bed until I could make it to the floor. When I got removable casts, I added ankle ROM exercises to my daily routine. The minor improvements I see each day make them all fly by because I'm excited for the next milestone.

I get my external pins removed from my left foot in 2 days and expect to be put in a walking boot with weight-bearing soon after. From there, I'll have one semi-functional foot and the world better be ready for my knee scooter!

Hang in there, cause if your injury is anything like mine, the first month is very slow and painful. I remember having terrible muscle spasms in my feet that never seemed to end. I remember dreaming about a day where I forgot about them. The other day, I said, "Huh, I forgot about those." Stay busy, eat right, and fight every single day. After that first month, you start hitting milestones and things start moving faster.

You told me before to have long-term goals and dreams to help stay motivated. My motivation to make a full recovery is that I'll be leaving the Midwest when I graduate, and you can bet when I get where I'm going I won't be sitting around.

Bryan I would love to here how you are doing now. My son is going throw a similar situation. Both of his legs are broken and one has to have reconstructive surgery. He doesn’t have casts on because he had to have a flap put on his leg in order for them to strengthen the bone and go back in. He is an athlete but is in excruciating pain whenever he’s moving from one place to the other, along with severe nerve pain. It’s only week 3 since the surgery and it seems like forever to go. Today was the worse day yet. He was in so much pain and I felt helpless. Any suggestions on nerve pain?

Lakisha, 

I'm sorry to hear about your son. I know the nerve pain game all too well. Unfortunately, there's not much you can do during that phase of recovery except grit your teeth and get through it. 3 weeks out is still very early, and it will feel like the future is so damn far away. Progress was noticeable every single day for the first year, and I noticed improvements weekly through my second year. In my third year, I'm still getting better, but the improvements are much harder won.

Since I last posted, I've moved to Washington and have been "getting after it" ever since. I trained for and ran my first trail marathon. I learned how to ski and worked hard to be strong enough to ski my dream line on Rainier last spring. I've climbed my hardest sport climbs, my hardest boulders, and my hardest trad climbs since my injury. I've done a handful of days with 10+ mile approaches and 10+ pitches of climbing car to car. None of it has felt easy, and I've spent more days than I'd like to admit hobbling around after a big day, but thank god I get to stick it to the doctors that told me I would never hike again. 

When I think about who I was before all of this, I can't recognize the person. I've learned to work hard, set goals, and stay positive through setbacks. I read Steph Abegg's recovery blog a hundred times and tried to emulate her strength and willingness to work hard through her recovery even when the outcome was uncertain. I wouldn't wish it on anyone, but it's been an extremely valuable experience for me.

I hope writing this helps your son or anyone reading this in some way. It's a long, long process and the hardest part is staying motivated through the years. Recovery is hell; days, weeks, months, and years of it are pretty exhausting. Despite what doctors will tell you, though, you can make it back to doing what you love. Best of luck.

Thank you so much for responding. Your message is very inspiring. Keep pushing and we will do the same! Thanks again!