"You can break my bones, but you can't break my will" - A recovery unheard of by modern medicine. (SWC)

My miraculous recovery

On the 26th of December 2016, I suffered from a gruesome Right lateral Tibia fracture from a football injury. I was pushed from behind while trying to control the ball and as I stretched my right ankle to stabilise myself, the wet and uneven field made me slipped and my ankle twisted at an unimaginable angle. The moment my ankle twisted, literally everyone, including me, could hear the sound of the pop and the snap. Next thing I knew, a pain I never knew I could possibly experience was taking over my ankle and my whole body.

My rugby team

During my days as a long distance runner

A little bit about me; I’m a 23 years old medical student who is own my way to become a full-fledge doctor in a few months. I am an all-rounder athlete – I play all sort of sports from Rugby (my most dedicated sports), football, trek and field event, long distance marathon, futsal and badminton. I have had my stint of success, winning from local to international competition in some of those disciplines. I take sports seriously because the accumulated stress and mundane mood from the morning shift at the hospital needed an avenue to be channeled out.

One of my lecturer recorded my operation and snapped some shots

Despite knowing everything that there is to know about fracture and its management, the only thing that was missing was experiencing one and it could not have come at a better time since I suffered the injury during my Anaesthesia posting which was subsequently a week from final exam. Needless to say, I was depressed, very depressed. Being admitted to the ward immediately the same night, having to think about stuff I haven’t got done in my room, things to study for exam, not being able to walk and became dependant in pretty much everything all of a sudden; all of which was overwhelming for me to swallow in a short while. I never had any surgery done before so I was understandably nervous – Yes, despite witnessing and helping with countless of surgeries before, never have I thought more about those rare complications of surgery than the time I was about to be subjected to one.

A stomach removed from a bariatric surgery

A metal rod had to be inserted to stabilise the fracture internally while allowing i to heal and screws were needed to anchor the metal rods to the bone. This procedure is known as Open Reduction Internal Fixation (ORIF).

It was through this experience, I discovered my superpower – My biological ability to withstand sedation and suppression – In other words, untameable. The night before the surgery, they gave me half a pill of Midazolam (a potent standard dose of benzodiazepine) to give better sleep and allay anxiety. For most if not all people, that does would have been enough but for me, I went on and stayed up for the next 2 hours and managed to study 2 chapters on Ophtalmology! It didn’t stop there – routinely, we give another half a pill before surgery to lower down the heart rate and blood pressure. Me? My heart rate when beyond 100 beats per minutes, which in medical term is called tachycardia. After they were done with administering the pain killer and Anaesthesia through my back, they tried to put me to sleep with one full syringe of another dose of sedation. What was supposed to put me to sleep for a full 2 hours, had me waking up at just 30 minutes into the surgery. I tapped on the Anaesthesiologist who was sitting to the left of my face and said “Hey, urm, can you put me back to sleep?”. Her eyeballs were wider than those of Grave’s disease’s patients. She was shocked to see me waking up but proceeded with another dose of sedation afterward. I remember my tagline was 'refuse to be normal' but didn't realise that my body was also in the same tune.

Now, you’d probably going to hate my surgeon for this but he did a pretty sloppy job to be honest – He misdiagnosed 2 torn ligaments and didn't put a syndesmotic screw (a screw traversing the fibula and tibia bone for stability) in the first surgery. Having to go through 2 more surgeries back to back just a few days after this first one, I experienced the same freak occurrences with sedative medication but this time, due to the back to back surgery, I was told that my recover period would take at 6 weeks before I can move around again because of the pain, the newly inserted screw piercing the bone and the recovery. I took my exam on wheelchair in between the surgery which was unheard of in my university haha.

In the exam hall

You see, I despise being dependant on people and I’m just really really used to doing things by myself. I was so determined to attend as many teaching sessions, ward work and academic schedule that I didn’t take any leave and wanted to go to class right away! That determination and passion to do what I love led me to doing the unthinkable – I, independently went to class, limping for 600m from my apartment to the hospital, going up and down flights of stairs like it was just another day at the park. I kid you not, it was amazing! I’ve never used crutches before and it takes time to get used to it and also it’s very tiring to use it (according to my friend with experience of using it) but miraculously, it felt like I’ve learnt how to use this long ago, like an innate muscle memory stored and unleashed flawlessly, I hardly look like I was having a hard time.

Just a week after of being discharged, the very next week, I was back at the hospital, first thing in the morning, doing rounds, with the rest of the doctors. I was even doing my night call on crutches and cleaning up wounds and stitches at the clinics. Yes, I was the living Dr House at this point, limping around, attending patients and managing their wounds and conditions. Now, I am a big fan of House and occasionally wishes to have his brilliant diagnosing ability (minus the vile behaviour though) however, apparently I got neither, just the limping part. My surgeon who saw me the immediate morning was taken aback and dumbfounded. “How are you here? How are you not in pain?” He said. The reason why he was so shocked because we both know that there is no way someone was supposed to ambulate and able to withstand the local pain that fast! I told him, “I can handle it, it doesn’t hurt”. He was amazed and took pictures of me right away! It wasn’t long before a lot more of other lecturers and even the Dean heard about it.

Doing night calls with my colleague

Some expressed their concern but I couldn’t help it, I really wanted to continue my academic schedule and that will power made my healing and pain tolerance incredibly fast and high. I keep telling them, it doesn’t hurt and I can’t even explain why. I was doing daily errands, walking around to the mall and even did meeting within less than 3 weeks of post-recovery!

I could recall meeting a patient who was in pain following a carpal tunnel release surgery at the clinic. She was adamant that the stitch removal was going to be painful and kept asking the nurse for pain killers but as soon as she saw me, coming to her and was the one who was going to remove her stitches, she was stunned. She looked at me as I explained to her what I was going to do and she didn’t even blink throughout my explanation. “This won’t hurt that much, trust me, I’ve had stitches removed before as well and it was the least painful thing I’ve experienced of late” I told her. She smiled, said “Okay” and let me do what I had to do. She didn’t even flinched every step of the way! “Thank you doctor, you made me realise how petty I was with my pain” She said while staring at my right ankle. She added “That really put things back into perspective, have a good day dr, you’re so inspiring”.

That was some of the best thing I’ve got from this experience. Words of encouragement and the opportunity to inspire people was definitely some of the best thing I was able to do. Sometimes, doctors don’t realise that patients are anxious about their condition and are scared about what they don’t understand. What they need sometime are words of encouragement, support, active listening and genuine empathy. I guess it’s not enough to learn about conditions alone, you need to experience what patients go through as well to genuinely understand what being a patient is like and to develop honest empathy when consulting patients. You’d take patient-care more holistically once you’ve been a patient and it’s not something any textbook can make you truly comprehend. My story resonated from patients to patients and my miraculously recovery astonished my Orthopaedic surgeons. I was a fluke at the department but to me, I attributed my ridiculously fast recovery not to any superpower (at least not that I know of), but the burning desire to strive for knowledge and help people gave, which is something I am truly passionate about.

Remember, if you love what you do, you don’t have to work a single day of your life! Never lose hope, people who are strong can achieve wonders even in the darkest of time.

Thank you for reading, If you enjoyed this post, definitely smash the vote button :) I always look forward to inspiring more people along the way as I've been giving motivational talk regularly from time to time.