April 27th, 2025

Introduction

Hello! My name is Shane Coleman. I wanted to start a blog and treat it as a personal journal while I am facing some hardship in life. First, a little bit more about me. I am a 20 year old student from Boulder, Colorado that also works as a server. I love my job, I love the education I am getting, and outside of that I like to think I live an active life. I love snowboarding, skateboarding, playing with wooden skill toys called kendamas, really anything that gets my brain and body active.

I recently sustained a nasty knee injury while snowboarding, fracturing my left kneecap in two which resulted in me getting surgery to fix it. What messed me up the most about this knee injury is how it was my own body that caused it. I didn’t hit my knee on anything or fall in any weird way while on my snowboard; I landed a jump and next thing I knew I was screaming like my life depended on it in the middle of Bluebell at Winter Park. Sorry to instill a new fear for you snowboarders or skiers, but I like to think that I just got real unlucky. As a result, I am in a knee brace for about 6 more weeks, rendering me pretty unable to get back to doing the things I love doing for what feels like a lifetime.

As stated earlier, I will be using this page to share my experience dealing with this injury both physically and mentally. With not being able to walk, run, dance, skate, hike, or play kendama freely right now I thought I would turn to other mediums of keeping my brain active and occupied. I almost feel like a young Jack Torrence in my house right now, all cooped up with nothing better to do than to write. All work and no play makes Shane feel like a dull boy if you’re catching my drift.

Thank you for whoever chooses to read or follow this blog. I hope that through this I can get across feelings and concepts that even I myself never thought about before sustaining this serious of an injury. The content of this blog will be from my point of view and my opinions and perspectives on life. I plan on making daily entries to share my recovery as well as thoughts that come from my brain. Shane’s brain.

The Hardest Parts So Far

To preface this section, I am eternally grateful to have the help that I do throughout this hardship. My parents, my family, my roommates, and the friends that have helped me get around and not go insane being alone in my house a lot of the time. You all know who you are and I would love to thank each and every one of you for the help you have given me. I am also very grateful for how quickly I was able to get medical help from ski patrol, the ER, and the surgeon that put my knee back together. This all could have been a lot worse and I am very grateful to be in a state where I still maintain most of my independence and dignity (meaning not having to subject a close friend or family member to wipe my ass, haha).

On the topic of independence and dignity, I would like to bring the emotion humility into play. This experience of not being able to walk without crutches, barely being able to help around my house, painstakingly making visits to the store with my roommates because I am desperate to get out of my house has taught me humility on a spectrum that I haven’t experienced before. With these types of injuries or situations, I’m sure that we all feel (myself included) some semblance of “Well, this could never happen to me”. You see someone else in the sled getting towed down by ski patrol, or you see a crazy car crash on the side of the road, or maybe hear a story of someone going through a traumatic brain injury and learning they will never walk or talk again: it is impossible to imagine yourself in those positions until it really does happen to you.