Australian Cycling Forums - Bicycles Network Australia

Retrobyte wrote: ↑

Thu Oct 17, 2024 10:22 pm

Chopper!

But seriously, glad they got it all

Could start a gardening business

https://www.facebook.com/choppaweedgardening/

Doing better than Niki Lauda there Foo.
He got on with it

Hope it heals quick and you can move on and get some ks in the legs.

warthog1 wrote: ↑

Thu Oct 17, 2024 10:30 pm

Doing better than Niki Lauda there Foo.
He got on with it

Hope it heals quick and you can move on and get some ks in the legs.

I remember watching that crash. No graft but still not allowed any excertion for the next week.

I still have my goals that I set when I started back on the bike, they have just taked few setbacks with how my job canned me with fatigue and then these pain in the arse health issues.

Foo

MichaelB wrote: ↑

Thu Oct 17, 2024 9:04 am

foo on patrol wrote: ↑

Wed Oct 16, 2024 8:24 pm

I go back in for the next op on my ear tomorrow morning. Hopefully they get everything this time and the skin graft heals as quick as the last one did. Then I'm praying that another lot doesn't turn up in the future because I'm almost guaranteed that I will lose a large part of my ear.

Foo

Good luck and keep thinking positive !

Thanks, I still have my long term goals in focus, trust me.

TrikeTragic wrote:

foo on patrol wrote: ↑

Wed Oct 16, 2024 8:24 pm

I go back in for the next op on my ear tomorrow morning. Hopefully they get everything this time and the skin graft heals as quick as the last one did. Then I'm praying that another lot doesn't turn up in the future because I'm almost guaranteed that I will lose a large part of my ear.

Foo

Best wishes for a successful procedure, Foo (and a clear biopsy of course), then the graft does you the right thing!

Cheers

Thanks, the biopsy results is the important one but no graft this time, just a chop n go.

warthog1 wrote:

Retrobyte wrote: ↑

Thu Oct 17, 2024 10:22 pm

Chopper!

But seriously, glad they got it all

Could start a gardening business

https://www.facebook.com/choppaweedgardening/

You better hope not because I'll come n clip your ears next year when I'm down there to watch the Bendigo Madison.

Foo

foo on patrol wrote: ↑

Fri Oct 18, 2024 6:14 am

You better hope not because I'll come n clip your ears next year when I'm down there to watch the Bendigo Madison.

Foo

That'll be one more madison than I've ever watched

Had my private orthopaedic follow-up for the fractured scapula today, 9 weeks post injury tomorrow.

It's all healing well, and won't need surgery. It's a bit of a weird fracture on CT - bone normally break through and it's literally just smashed into a few pieces where I hit the road, not even all the way through. Means it won't have any functional issues though.

Of course being modern medicine the whole process has triggered some investigation into my left humerus and why it's completely hollow. I fractured through this as a 9yo, and was followed up for years before finding it was still completely hollow 15 years ago, and still now remains completely hollow.

Being a paranoid doctor I've had it in the back of my head that it's something malignant that may kill me but of course as my wife says it hasn't done it in 34 years and is unlikely to now. The surgeon today described it as 'whatever it is, it's friendly' so has sent me off to a specialist in that sort of thing I think more to identify what it actually is and how likely it is to break.

I feel like I'm part of the Shimano recall with my Hollowtech (TM) humerus. It's within the specified date range, we just have to read the serial number. On the other hand it just survived being ploughed into the road at 48km/hr so is probably pretty tough.

Mr Purple wrote: ↑

Fri Oct 18, 2024 11:22 am

and still now remains completely hollow.

Weight weenie

P!N20 wrote: ↑

Fri Oct 18, 2024 11:26 am

Mr Purple wrote: ↑

Fri Oct 18, 2024 11:22 am

and still now remains completely hollow.

Weight weenie

Yep, it's bizarre.

I think the bit that had everyone freaking out is the list of things it can be in a 43 year old is bad, the list of things it can be in a 9yo is less so.

Given it's been there the whole time it's probably the latter!

Hi:
Not in competition with Foo for the most off-putting head shot all! This is my skull a day or so after the third (and hopefully final) procedure to remove the skin cancer and "re-engineer" it to fill the void in front of my temple where the cancer and some bone were removed. The central "hatched" bit is the graft from my thigh! Plastic surgery magic.....


Ten days since the procedure, there's minimal pain around the head - my ear throbs occasionally. The graft donor site on my thigh is about 10 cm X 35 cm, it has some bite especially in the first few steps after I've sitting down for a while. Panadol does the trick. The dressing on my head is being changed every two days (Hospital In The Home) and should come off altogether at a clinic day on Wednesday. The dressing on my thigh will be there for at least a week after that (so three weeks from the op). No riding until that comes off!

Cheers

TrikeTragic - you have photo evidence that you are not an air head

Jebus TrikeTragic, that's a hell of a slab taken out. I certainly hope that you don't need anymore ops of this nature at all.

How do you go sleeping with that?

Foo

foo on patrol wrote: ↑

Sun Oct 20, 2024 6:55 am

Snip ...snip How do you go sleeping with that?

Foo

Not fantastic - but better than the tree weeks with a drain hanging off my face! Pretty much can't sleep left side down - and I've always been a "either side" sleeper, rarely flat on my back. So I'm waking quite a bit more during the night.

Hopefully that should sort itself out when the head dressing comes off - and that's expected to be Wednesday this week. The graft and the relocated hair line (the plastic surgeons call this "a flap") are not sore or super-sensitive at all. The area of my temple, so in front of the ear, that's a little more sensitive, but again that should settle once stitches are out.

Still available for hire to scare small children if you're into Halloween..... Trying to change my forum sign-off to "Scarface".

Cheers

Jebus Alan, that's definitely major - glad you are recovering well. That's the sort of photo that should be used in "slip, slop, slap" campaigns - very real.

TrikeTragic wrote: ↑

Sun Oct 20, 2024 8:03 am

Still available for hire to scare small children if you're into Halloween..... Trying to change my forum sign-off to "Scarface".

Cheers

That's scary stuff! Good that you are recovering.

Retrobyte wrote: ↑

Sun Oct 20, 2024 10:59 am

snip ...snip. That's the sort of photo that should be used in "slip, slop, slap" campaigns - very real.

Surgeon says it's most likely the result of a mis-spent childhood - growing up on a dairy farm in the 50's & 60's, when sunscreen was SF (not very much) if we applied it at all, hats worn sometimes, sunburned too many times to remember. Then early adulthood in the military, lots of "bush time", a fair but of that in Qld, when the famous "giggle hat" wasn't well known for its wide brim coverage. He says it's the early years that hurt most!!

I've been a "hat-dude" since my 50's, "slop" the sunscreen on when I ride in the high UV months. Didn't stop this little bugger! The surgeon has warned me that the skin cancer could come back at any time - so I'll be extra-vigilant and increase those skin checks to bi-annual.

Cheers

TrikeTragic wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 21, 2024 9:30 am

Retrobyte wrote: ↑

Sun Oct 20, 2024 10:59 am

snip ...snip. That's the sort of photo that should be used in "slip, slop, slap" campaigns - very real.

Surgeon says it's most likely the result of a mis-spent childhood - growing up on a dairy farm in the 50's & 60's, when sunscreen was SF (not very much) if we applied it at all, hats worn sometimes, sunburned too many times to remember. Then early adulthood in the military, lots of "bush time", a fair but of that in Qld, when the famous "giggle hat" wasn't well known for its wide brim coverage. He says it's the early years that hurt most!!

I've been a "hat-dude" since my 50's, "slop" the sunscreen on when I ride in the high UV months. Didn't stop this little bugger! The surgeon has warned me that the skin cancer could come back at any time - so I'll be extra-vigilant and increase those skin checks to bi-annual.

Cheers

The 'early years' you speak of, the 'halcyon years' in cycling to me, were indeed mis-spent, the evidence of that coming up 20 years later, and here we are, all lining up for the plastic surgeon! Sun protection, sunscreen, skin cancer...all this was unknown to me in the 60s (in Ireland) and later in the 1970s, only becoming a big issue from 2007 when I had a Stage 1 melanoma on my back excised (curative). A cathartic moment, a klaxon sounding of "Beware! Beware!".

I suspect all the protection you can slap on may be a tad too late; as is evident in that photo, the sun damage has been extensive — God, it was a shock-and-awe moment to land on that photo and see the amount of work done. When cycling, wear a skully covering the entire head, down over years and back of neck — even in summer (and a skully can be hot!) when protection is manifestly critical. I learnt so much from my middle-helix skin graft on my right ear in 2022 — a product of direct, intense sun, mostly through cycling in the 1980s and 1990s; same thing with the dorsal graft on right hand which probably came from the unprotected hands when driving around the outback in 2011 (without exception, I now were cycling mitts — not just for cycling, whenever I am out in the sun). I have successfully treated non-benign legions in a few places on hands and arms with 5FU chemotherapy (cream).

One can sure hope they've got the majority of the legion out with such extensive surgery as that. The job now is to protect the graft from any and all sun exposure — wear a hat (an akubra is excellent!) and consider gloves/mitts in the summer.

CmdrBiggles wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 21, 2024 11:34 am

I suspect all the protection you can slap on may be a tad too late

That's a dangerous myth to promote - just to pick one article The Sun Keeps Rising: Why Seniors Can’t Skip UV Protection

TrikeTragic wrote: ↑

Mon Oct 21, 2024 9:30 am

Retrobyte wrote: ↑

Sun Oct 20, 2024 10:59 am

snip ...snip. That's the sort of photo that should be used in "slip, slop, slap" campaigns - very real.

Surgeon says it's most likely the result of a mis-spent childhood - growing up on a dairy farm in the 50's & 60's, when sunscreen was SF (not very much) if we applied it at all, hats worn sometimes, sunburned too many times to remember. Then early adulthood in the military, lots of "bush time", a fair but of that in Qld, when the famous "giggle hat" wasn't well known for its wide brim coverage. He says it's the early years that hurt most!!

I've been a "hat-dude" since my 50's, "slop" the sunscreen on when I ride in the high UV months. Didn't stop this little bugger! The surgeon has warned me that the skin cancer could come back at any time - so I'll be extra-vigilant and increase those skin checks to bi-annual.

Cheers

Yes commiserations to you - that is one heck of a big operation site !

As they say, you can lead a horse to water but you cannot make it drink.
You and I might be aware of the dangers of excessive sun exposure but you know what they say about the young un’s - think that they are indestructible.

Today i saw 2 blokes working in the sun on a construction site
One wearing no shirt and a baseball cap.
The other wearing long sleeve collared shirt and broad brimmed hat. Both doing same duties, one with best practice sun protective clothing and one not.

I spent some time working at a military base as a civilian contractor in the late 1990’s.
In those days there was a lot of emphasis on sun protection.
But there were some glaring inconsistencies.
Soldiers were expected to use broad brim hats or traditional army felt hats at all times outdoors.
Except the Armoured Corps guys (M113 Armoured Vehicles) - which members would spend days or weeks out in the sun on field training exercises wearing baseball-style caps only which gave no sun protection to ears and neck etc.

I feel that sometimes just to get the message through to others, the photo's that we've posted is the only way for it to sink in that you have to make the concerted effort in covering up properly with with suncreen and other gear.

Foo

Happy dance, I got the external stitches out this morning and the Dr told me that they got everything, so a check up in three months time just to make sure that everything is goodly.

Foo

^^^^^^^
Great news Foo!

Cheers

Great to hear!

awesome news Foo

Good stuff Foo!

Now, time to get the whipper snipper out to clean off all the cobwebs and moss off your bikes.

Good onya Foo, that's great news mate.....hope you don't have anymore issues with the skin cancers and you can concentrate getting back to life again. All the best with it and .........Slip Slop Slap