This time last year!

Do not look and read this post if your squeamish : some pictures might put you off. close your eyes and scroll down the page to see the pumpkins :-P


This time last year, has been one of thoses days I shall not forget it been one of the most painful experince I have ever been through. The reason for that. I was actually in hospital with a serious ankle injury after playing football and a nasty tackle by another player has caused 3 ligaments in my ankle to snap.

After being taken to hospital I had no choice but to have an operation to fixed the ligaments. That time the surgeon said that I may not get the full movement back in the ankle again which I was pretty upset that it might affect my football cerear. After 5 and half hour surgery to fix the ligaments. I had to be put in a cast for 9 weeks to heal and to hop around with crutches for 12 weeks

9 weeks was along time for me, it really did annoy you when you needed a scratch but couldn't and we wasn't allowed to put anything down there to scratch it. Also the crutches really did get on my nerves because I needed to use my hands to communicate as I refused to use my voice at the time and every time I wanted to say something I hand to stop and get my hands out to sign what I want to say.

Every 3 weeks, my cast was removed and then replaces with a new cast because it was getting lose and was able to move my foot around a bit in it. So, while they changed the cast I was allowed to pick a colour, so first 3 weeks I had blue, the 2nd 3 weeks I had bright green and the last 3 weeks I had purple. That was the only thing I liked about the cast because the colours.

After 9 weeks being in a cast it was finally removed and my scar is neat (you can see in the picture) and the MRI pictures shows that my ligaments was all fixand the cast was ready to be taken off. I coundn't remove my foot at all when they remove it. It was sooooo stiff that I had to have alot of rehabiliation at the physio. I was at physio almost every day for 2 hours for a good 3 months. It was hard going to physio and going to college to catch up the works I missed. The first 3 weeks of physio I was learning to put weight on my foot again and eventually I was able to walk without crutches, I was pleased about that as I did hate them.

We did lots of foot work exercise and I also had lots of massage from the physio to help it relax and get it to move. Physio can be very painful but at some point I enjoyed physio because the last half an hour we got to play badminton or volley ball on our bums. It was fun and it helps me to stay motivated and work hard with my foot movement. After 3 months of rehab my foot finally had some movements and I was able to walk, jog, jump and run. The only thing I couldn't do is turn my foot inwards fully, which that is the only movement I won't be able to do and still can't do it.

I got back into football after being out for almost 7 months. There were lots of fitness training to catch up on but the only problem I had was I wasn't able to dribble quicker with my left foot like I used to. So, I learnt to use my right foot and became better at it. So, bacially I just use my right foot to either shoot or cross the ball and my right foot to dribble to different spaces, before I just used my left foot all the time.

It shows that I worked soo hard and that I didn't give up. Now after a year of hard work I have manage to make 2 caps for england and I am looking forward to make more international caps :-D