Last year, I took a two-week trip across the country to see my sister on the east coast. On the second day of my trip, we went to the downtown area to walk by the water and decided spontaneously to go into a military-ship-turned-museum type of place. We browsed through different exhibit rooms on the first floor before going up to the second floor deck area where we got to look out towards the water. After enjoying the view for a while, we headed back downstairs to leave. On my way down, on the last step of the stairs where my right foot was to step down onto the first floor and my left foot was to follow, my right foot landed on a bump and I rolled my right ankle to the right.

My ankle hit the hard metal that the ship was made of, with my full body weight on it. Next thing I know I’m on the ground in pain and unable to move my right leg. My sister and her boyfriend who were behind me quickly rushed down to see what happened, and a few employees at the museum came to check on me, asking if I needed an ambulance called, etc. I applied an ice pack they gave me to my ankle and then tried but failed to stand on my own. My sister’s boyfriend went to get the car as I tried to make the walk out with my weight mostly on the left foot and half leaning on my sister.

For the next two weeks, I couldn’t do much. Whatever I did that was not staying completely still and off my right foot, it hurt. I got depressed quickly, feeling like everything was a huge contrast to what I had anticipated the trip to be, especially since it was my first time traveling to see my sister after the start of the pandemic. This blog will go through the phases I went through after the injury to move past the sinking feeling and get back on my feet, both literally and figuratively.

Letting myself be sad for a little bit

I had a hard time accepting that I hurt myself and could only spend the two weeks lying horizontally on the sofa with my foot up. I was upset at many things but most of all myself. I frequently sprained my ankle growing up but I felt it ridiculous of me to get hurt in such a stupid way. I was going to miss out on visiting places with my sister and it felt like I took the fun away from both of us. We had planned to visit cool spots around town and spend a long weekend in NYC. Going on that military ship wasn’t even planned!

I felt down for obviously not being able to move easily. Before the injury, I had been working out four times a week for months, and I couldn’t believe I had to put a pause on a habit I worked so hard to build. I couldn’t stand…walk…or sometimes even sit, without feeling pain. Having to have many things done for me by my sister, I felt like I was adding chores to her instead of bringing her fun with my visit.

All of these things were going through my mind for the first few days after I hurt myself and I just sank in those negative emotions. My ankle turned purpler and darker each day, and my mood turned bluer with it. I let myself have those emotions for a while, but not for too long.

Not worrying about the uncontrollable

After a day or two I was tired of feeling this way. Nothing could cheer me up, and I was unmotivated to do anything. My heavy emotions were weighing on me, and I needed to come back from the dark side before it took over my entire trip. I decided to sit down and think rationally what was controllable vs not at this point. As stupid as it was for me to hurt myself like that, it had happened and could not be undone. My injured state was not controllable at this point, and I had to work with it whether I liked it or not.

Whenever I caught myself thinking through the incident again, I would shake my head no and tell myself to shake it off. Accepting the situation as it was knocked out a lot of my negative thoughts. It’s funny because I’ve had many people give me the advice of identifying what’s controllable vs uncontrollable and focusing on the controllable portion, but this was my first time being able to do it and feel the positive effect.

For me, it was about first being conscious of my thoughts and ensuring they are focused on what can actually be done. Now, when I find myself going down a negative trend, I ask myself…what’s controllable here?

Focusing on the present

While I wasn’t able to go anywhere, I didn’t have to let that ruin my entire trip. It’s not like I got to be with my sister everyday. We were still in the same place together for almost two weeks and it’d be such a shame to keep sulking as our time ran out. What’s done is done. The thought of wasting what could be quality time with my sister, on top of being in pain, really helped me shift my focus towards what I could still do to have fun with her.

With that shift, I began to see more of the good in the moment—anything from a cup of coffee, to a hilarious line from a tv show, to a nice dinner my sister made. I told myself to enjoy the moment because even in bad situations there are plenty to be grateful for and happy about if we look closely. I hope to continue to appreciate the small, ordinary elements of any situation as much as the big, extraordinary milestones that are shiny and easy to celebrate. It’s often not how shiny the moment is but who we share it with that fulfills us.

Learning to rely on others

Another uneasy feeling I had was having to ask my sister to do almost everything for me. I’m not good at relying on others, likely because I’ve lived on my own for a long time. I watched my sister prepare our meals, rinse our coffee cups, grab my ice packs, and do all kinds of other chores. She was like my servant, dishwasher, cook, and comedian, which I’d never ask her to be all at the same time but this situation kind of made her.

Though forcibly, the experience taught me how to rely on others and the merits of it. By learning to share my burden, I learned to let go, to trust, and to be vulnerable. I experienced that sharing a burden lightens it but requires strength, one that’s vastly different from the strength of handling obstacles on one’s own. Humans are social beings after all. Knowing we can rely on someone can be relieving, and actually doing it can show how courageous and trusting we are in our connections with others.

Conclusion

In the end, I got to spend some solid quality time with my sister. We chatted about life, watched a ton of movies and series, shared books we’re reading lately, and played with my sister’s two cats who adorably grew cozy with me given the massive amount of time i stayed horizontal and let them walk all over me ha! My sister is quite a cook and barista, so I had lots of delicious home cooked meals and amazing coffee.

Knowing how I usually sink into my negativity when facing accidents like these, I cannot be more glad that I took control of how I reacted to this situation and had grown a little from this experience. I let myself be sad and upset for a little while, not invalidating my feelings and reactive thoughts, but pulled myself out of it to not let it consume me. It felt balanced in a way.

Advices like “just let it go” or “don’t overthink it” are often so difficult follow in those raw moments. I found it much easier after taking some time to acknowledge my emotions and thoughts because those things are what make us all human.

Incidents like this one often seem like a nightmare in the moment, but what I’ve realized is in the future they will look like a small bump on the road. My ankle injury turned out to be a fractured bone, which explains why it hurt so much and for so long, but even then the pain and inconvenience were temporary with a clear path towards recovery in reasonable time. It’s important to zoom out the timeline to help us put things in perspective and tell the small bumps from the lasting damages. Small bumps are not easy either, but sometimes our normal gets disrupted, needing us to build it back up again, and that’s just part of life.