5. Broken Hip – March 2026

I am starting this post on March 31, 2026 – exactly three weeks after the unfortunate event. It is the first day I’ ve laid hands on my trusty laptop since the event so I’m pretty excited!

They discharged me from the rehab place (PPAR).
I am back in my Cogir apartment and my comfy situation there.
I am delighted to be back in the world!

I am kind of amazed that my wrist has healed enough to plausibly do touch-typing three weeks after the event … 18 days after the wrist surgery!

I am a basically healthy guy who is highly motivated to recover and get back to normal … of only I can stop messing myself up!
See next section 🙁

A little bit of pot and a lot alcohol seem to be a bad combo for older me

So How Did I Get Here?

Looking back at times I get into trouble, it’s when I feel extra good and energetic and god help me, kind of invincible(!!)

Normally I’m a pretty moderate drinker (honest!), but on these evenings I tend to drink too much and usually smoke a little pot to keep the party going.

I’d forgotten until Laura reminded me that I blacked out in a parking lot towards the end of my time living in Reno – somewhere in 2021,2,3. I will search my old notebooks and see if I can pinpoint it. Somebody had some really strong pot I wasn’t used to, and I had partied pretty hard, and boom! broken wrist!

Recovery is a bitch

It is evidently the rule up here in Sonoma that the Emergency wagon always take you to Providence Hospital in Santa Rosa, no matter how many times you tell them you are Kaiser, their remit is to take you to Providence.

Nothing against Providence. They are competent and cheerful and helpful, but it means an extra run to take me from Providence to Kaiser a day or so later. That seems wasteful.

They bandaged up my wrist in a way that they knew would be temporary, but the wrist needed some kind of protection.

EMTs again: Providence Hospital to Kaiser Santa Rosa

• Wednesday,
  • start the day in Providence,
  • be taken in a ward at the Kaiser Hospital
  • get settled.
• Thursday, do all the prep stuff for operating today.
• Friday March 13, do all the prep stuff for operation AGAIN because they postponed me yesterday.
  Do the operation!
  • Got a big ole Ace bandage wrapper on my left wrist, with a some kind of solid base.
    • They explained that there is a strip of metal inside my arm!
    • They mentioned this would be a problem later!
  • The left leg looks pretty normal, but it feels messed up.
• Saturday, they wanted to move me out, but I got a one day reprieve.
  • I thought they were being extra nice, but now I’m pretty sure they couldn’t find a place with an available bed to take me to until tomorrow. 🙂

Sunday get moved in the Emergency wagon for the final time!

Kaiser Hospital –> Petaluma Post-Acute Rehab

Two plus weeks at the rehab place

My new home for the rest of March is PPAR – Petaluma Post-Acute Rehab.

First impression of the place was that it was chaotic and grimy, with sketchy people wandering the halls … i.e. not where you would spend any time if you had a choice.

But once I settled in and got the swing of how they do things, I got kinda attached to the place! The food wasn’t good at first and never got any better, but the people were mostly kind and compassionate and did their best!

So except when it was time to eat it was a nice enough place to put in my time..

What do I miss the most

My laptop!

Discharged from PPAR, back to my happy home at Cogir

Discharged from PPAR on March 31, 2026. Martha came took me away from all this and brought me back to Cogir. I went to my room and stayed there.

Wednesday April 1, 2026 was my first real day back in the swing of Cogir life!

Home Rehab visits are winding up

Tuesday April 28: I’ve been back in my native habitat for exactly 4 weeks … which seems to be the exact amount of time that Kaiser will pay for home follow-up visits!

When you’re on the home health care list Kaiser takes pretty good care of you! I had:

• Two nurses – the executive nurse came first, then Nurse Mercedes came every week.
• Occupational therapist – Sophia – My hero because she assembled my shower stool 🙂
• Physical therapist – Cesar – walk the stairs. He didn’t make much of an impression.
• Home aide – Barbara – helped me take showers. I liked her!

They were all lovely people.

Real World Happenings

• April 11 – Tyler’s wedding takes place outside on a cool, wet Saturday in Brian’s back yard.
  • I’m still pretty immobile, so I basically stayed whereever they put me. 🙁
  • but it was a cool event!
• April 12 – The next day my ole Autodesk buddy Dave Primmer drove up from South Bay to visit
  • He made my new laptop work … he’s a genius and a godsend! 🙂
• Thursday Apr 16 – My Reno friend Ed visits
  • Friday, he takes us on a really fun drive to the coast – thanks Ed!
  • Saturday, he goes back to Reno

I’m walking better!

Wed April 29 – Up at the crack of dawn! (or so it seemed for me, it was really 8:30 🙂 Chad drives me to a dentist appointment four blocks from his house.
We do the hard work part of the procedure, which is measuring for the crown and getting the tooth ready to have it glued on.

Fri May 1 – Chad drives me to appointment with Orthopedic doctor (Dr Paci), who takes off the big Ace bandage cast and gives me a removable nylon sleeve. 🙂 I always like seeing Dr Paci!

Mon May 18 – I’m driving again, Chad’s off the hook for taking me everywhere!
Back to the dentist for the easy and fun part, namely gluing the new crown onto the tooth stub the set up last time.

The metal bar is still in in my left wrist, 🙁

That second wrist surgery really IS a pain

Back when I got the operation, the hospital staff warned me in about the piece of metal in my wrist.

They all said that living with it day to day was not a big deal, but when it is time to take it out, removing it is a pretty big pain in the ass!

Well, that time is finally here.
That surgery is scheduled for next Wednesday May 27.

And yes, it was a big deal and a big pain in the ass.

Tuesday is pre-surgery day

Almost everything else you do at a Kaiser appointment is predictable and easily schedulee, except for surgeries.

Your surgery schedule depends your doctor, the room your surgery is supposed to happen, and a host of other little things.

Monday was Memorial Day, so everything was closed.
Tuesday I went to the Rohnert Park Kaiser to get pre-surgery things done:

• yet one more X-ray.
  • Kaiser charges a hard $30 per x-ray, cash on the barrelhead today!
• Pick up a pre-op kit
  • a pint of Ensure – special, enhanced Ensure I believe.
    They act like it has magical powers!
    I exaggerate, but they DO set a lot of store by drinking one before surgery.
  • a couple of packets of extra special wipes to wipe yourself down pre-op.
    • From the neck down, not armpits or genital area.
    • Wait ½ hour after showering

Wednesday is The Longest Day

Today, Wed June 10, is surgery day.

My daughter had stuff to do, so she picked me up early and got me to Kaiser intake at a little before noon for my 1:45 appointment.

[Would you believe that I did not make it back home until after midnight!]

The story of that day is detailed below.
It’s not really very exciting, but I want to get it off my chest, so here is comes!

The tick-tock – Wednesday May 27

• Arrive 11:30, way too early.
  Get sent to the lobby for an hour or so.
  This was expected. I brought my book and a fully charged phone.
• Official appointment was for 1:45.
  • At 1:30 rude Kaiser lady hustled me upstairs .
  • Upstairs was not expecting me yet.
  • So I spend the next 20 minutes in an uncomfortable chair with bad lighting when I could have been remained in the nice lobby area.
    But hey, whatever’s convenient for the rude lady.
• Then things start to happen.
  • I’m hustled around the labyrinthine second floor hallways to the big room that was familiar from other operations.
  • I’m gonna call it the Staging Area.
    It’s REALLY busy and noisy and could seem chaotic, until you realize every person is doing what they’re doing with a serious purpose.
    It’s THE place where everything but the actual operation gets done.
  • I was led me to my own gurney.
    • They gave me privacy to take off my clothes and put on my gown.
    • Then the time-honored hospital tradition of sticking an IV in your arm for the length of the stay.
    • I think I was all setted and comfy by 12:30, for what we all thought was going to a wait until maybe 3 or 3:30.
    • I got False Hope soon thereafter because I got my visit from the Head Anesthesiologist,
      • Short version:
        They probably will NOT do general anesthetic.
        They’ll do a strong local anesthetic that will wear off quicker.
        It will all seem the same to me because I’ll be out of it!
    • I call it false hope because STILL nothing happened,
    • Next text to the family was at 5:26.
      • My aide keeps telling me about what a complicated procedure Dr Paci is doing – “skilled hand surgery”.
      • I have no doubt that’s true, but why couldn’t they have gotten in my little unskilled bit of metal removal out of the way before all that high-tech work?
    • My aide was a very pleasant little asian (chinese?) woman who hung at my side the whole damn day (except when she took her break while I waited). Because I’m a dork I did not get her name, but I could not have asked for a better side-kick 🙂
      • Very kind and sypathetic.
    • Back to the sad narrative. Next text to family was 6:30.
      Dr is still doing things more important than me.
    • Some in the 7-7:30 range IT HAPPENED!
      • I get the long-anticipated in-person visit from the doctor!
      • That went very well.
        I really like Dr Paci, and she seems actually entertained by ole weird me, so we get along great!
      • I got to ask her about my slow healing hip which I’ve wanted to do for quite a while!
  • But it was a false hope again.
    • After Doctor Paci’s appearance, I thought my surgery would happen soon!
    • Wrong, wrong, wrong … by about 2.5 hours.
  • My family are hard working early-to-bed folks.
    I knew this bullcrap of someone staying on ALERT until 10, 11, 12PM so they could drive me home was killing them.
    • Somewhere in the 11-ish range Martha texted that she would rather come on the morning, which shows how over it she was!
    • Of course we know that’s not how this works.
      We are at the service of Kaiser’s schedule.
      Our petty concerns might have mattered last week but not now.
  • She left Petaluma at 11:28 PM,
    • picked me up a the front door of the hospital at a little after 12,
      • No parking problems at Midnight!
    • got me back to Cogir 15 minutes after that.
      No traffic that time of noght.
    • WHEW What an awful day!

After surgery

There will be plenty of time to natter on about my usual health stuff, but this it a 5 AM Thursday post surgery report on how wired up I still am!!

I don’t know if my pain meds had some kind of stimulant in them but here it is 5:34 AM and I am still typing like a fiend.

I do get this way on my own. In fact the night I broke my first hip I was feeling so damn good that I did stupid things.

I could just be high on life because I’m FREE and this wrist thing is over.

From all the warnings in the pre-surgery literature, I think it must be hard on a lot of people. But this little ole metal-bar-removal thing was a piece of cake once they got around to doing it.

Well, whatever … at 5:57AM I am finally feeling sleepy!
Man o man, that 11:30AM knock on the door by the Cogir cleaning (every Thursday whether you need it or not 🙂 is going to come too soon.

I know Kaiser LOVES to count their efficiency beans.
How more efficiently they could have spent resources on other things for … 6 or 7 of the 11 hours they had me on a gurney with a dedicated helper.

Still recovering. Physical Therapy next Thursday

• 6/10 Wed – Cast off
• 6/12 Fri – First Phys therapy
• 6/25 Thurs – Second Phys therapy

The day after 4th of July (July 5, duh 🙂 was special because I put on socks!!!

Since I broke my left hip I have been unable to reach my left foot sufficiently to get a sock over it, but I did this Sunday.

Thurs July 9 was Dr Paci day. An occasionion to have a face to face with your orthopedic surgeon is a BFD in Kaiser world! I think I even wrote down my questions:

• The break was to the radial metacarpal bone
  • the long bone below index finger
  • and some of those little bones below!
• The radius is the bigger arm bone down from your thumb.
• The ulna is the smaller arm bone at the litt.le finger side.
  • It rotates more (I think).
• 5/26
  • Stable wrist ORIF with healing subacute fracture of the distal radius and ulnar styloid
• 6/10 From the medical notes
  • Patient is status post interval removal of plate and screws traversing through the distal radius as well as index finger metacarpal.
  • Communited(?), intra-articular fracture of the distal radius is identified with the fracture cleft still visualized with minimal sclerosis around the fracture site.
  • No significant change in the fracture of the ulnar styloid process.
  • Tract marks from previously placed screws is noted.
  • Dorsal tilt of the distal radius of approximately 10 degrees with soft tissue swelling of the dorsum of the wrist
• 7/9 From the medical notes:
  • Healing distal radial and ulnar styloid process fracture with similar alignment
• 5/1/2026 xrays also

One Month Later

I’m editing this ONE MORE TIME on August 1, 2026, and I am happy to report that I keep improving.

Summary of it all:

• I broke my right hip in November 2025.
  • That surgery gave me a titanium ball joint in that hip.
• I broke my left hip in February 2026.
  • Hard to believe anybody could be stupid enough to do both those things in a six month period, but that’s what I did.
  • This one was a different kind of fracture. This surgery did NOT replace the ball joint, rather it gave me a titanium left femur.
• In that February 2026 accident, I also broke my left wrist (I’m left-handed of course) in a fairly complicated fracture.
  • That surgery gave me a metal strip in my wrist to provide stability for the bone-knitting process that stayed on there for about three months.

I can now do a decent imitation of walking semi-normally. The first step in the morning, and even the first step every time I get up from a table requires a deep breath and some planning, but after that first one I can go pretty well!

I walk the parking lot loop around our building every few days. My pedometer app says it’s a little less than a mile. I should be doing more ambitious walks, but there is nowhere interesting to walk around here so it’s hard to get motivated.

The wrist is doing well also! The piece of metal has been out for six weeks or so. I think it’s as “normal” as it’s ever going to get.

I still have to favor it getting up from chairs and that sort of stuff, but it continues to improve.