The Healing Process

Twelve years ago I had an accident that resulted in multiple fractures to my left hand. I figured it was serious because the folks in the ER had called the medical center's top hand surgeon late in the evening to get his input. He had me see him the next morning and surgery was performed the following day. Before surgery, after surgery and during the two months of physical therapy I asked the doctor each week "How much functionality will I get back in my hand and how long will it take?" He would always say patiently "We'll see - just keep working on it".

It was a completely logical question on my part. When I first saw my hand unwrapped after surgery it was the size of a small football - it looked like an impossibly large cartoon hand. It was puffed on the top and bottom, the fingers were so swollen (like big fat sausages) that there were no gaps between them. A dozen pins protruded from my hand - holding together the fractures. The first few days of physical therapy I would sit and focus all my attention simply to wiggle my fingertips. Every few days I would see a little progress. Soon the second joint on each finger would flex a little, then the third joint would flex a little. There were weeks of constant work to regain range of motion in each joint. It didn't matter that it hurt to flex my fingers. It didn't matter what my hand looked like. Eventually we worked on recovering range of motion in my hand and wrist. Then there were strength building exercises - for the fingers, for the hand, for the arm.

Over time I pretty much regained all the function in the hand. The doctor took photos which he said would go with a journal article. When our work was done and my care complete I asked a new question. I asked, "Way back at the beginning, after surgery, how much functionality did you expect I was going to recover?". He replied that the injury had been so severe that he had never known how much I would recover or how long it would take. His gift to me ten years ago (besides fixing up my hand!) had been that he never told me that there could be any limitations, nor did he guess at timeframes. He had let my body work out the healing process without constraints. It would seem that given time and attention our bodies and minds are capable of healing from all sorts of traumas - much more so than we would imagine.