Trauma in Lisbon
I slipped and fell and I couldn't get up.
It’s spring in Lisbon and the sky is blue. Crowds are filling the outdoor cafes and the jacaranda trees are in full purple bloom. However, the city’s charms provide an opaque veneer over its dangers. And the biggest danger of them all… walking on Lisbon sidewalks.
You may think I’m referring to the white cobblestone calçadas, so much a symbol of Portugal, which would be an obvious assumption. The pretty, uneven pavement that spans the city absolutely wears down the knees and ankles over time like an old road does to car tires. So, if you’re walking through the city, the constant undulations of those white cobblestone walks should be avoided if possible. (It’s usually impossible.) This is especially true if you wish to avoid the kind of long term joint damage that keeps Lisbon orthopedists in high demand.
However, sometimes the biggest walking hazards are those we can’t see. Many of Lisbon’s calçada-lined sidewalks run adjacent to smooth stone pavement. It’s the smooth stuff where the biggest hazards lie since all it takes is a little wet spot, or in my case, a greasy spot, to make one fly through the air. It’s easy to gather speed and pick up the pace when the sidewalks are smooth. All it takes is one misstep for life to change in an instant. Sadly, I recently learned this lesson from personal experience in Benfica, one of the city’s outer districts..
I’m typically an intrepid explorer and I like to WALK FAST. During one of my many walks, on an ultra-smooth Benfica sidewalk, I hit an oily spot with my foot and BLAM! (The EMTs who arrived at the scene say the spot may had a remnant of a banana. Or was it a mango? I think it may have been some kind of industrial use oil but I’ll never know for sure.)
My spill happened so fast that I couldn’t take any evasive action before slamming my left hip directly into the concrete. In one of those unique prescient life moments, I knew I had broken something badly.
I’ve broken bones before - my foot when I was a kid and my elbow in my early thirties not to mention a myriad of toes both big and small, but this was the first time I’d broken something significant in my lower extremities. As I would later learn, it was the top of my femur. (Yes, it was a hip fracture.) As thoughts swirled in my head, I lay helplessly hoping for assistance and knowing that I had done some serious damage to my body.
“I’m in big trouble,” I said to Mindi on the phone, just moments after my spill.
I’ve never been so dependent on assistance in my life. Luckily, the Portuguese respond generously in a health crisis and this was no exception. A group of residents, business owners, bystanders and a crew from the nearby fire house immediately came by the scene to help.
“Don’t try to move,” I was told by one of the fire workers. I didn’t. The ambulance arrived a few minutes later. I was then taken to the Hospital Santa Maria - my first dalliance with the Portuguese public health system.
A Little Red Tape and Emergency Surgery
It was at that moment, the moment when the crews needed to move me, that I felt the worst pain of my life. I felt it again in the ambulance and on the x-ray table. I won’t get into details but they call this type of accident a trauma for good reason.
Diagnosis? I fractured the my hip at the top of my femur. The x-ray almost looked like a triangular chunk at the end of bone hit split off like a wedge of pie. I would need emergency surgery but I almost had to wait a few days due to the May Day holiday . Luckily, the surgeons finagled their schedule and fit me on April 30th. So, going forward, that day will always trigger memories of the brave and expert Portuguese surgeons who inserted a fresh titanium rod into my femur, hopefully saving my hip for another few decades of use.
After the surgery, my infernal pain was gone but I still had to make my operated hip functional - a process that I’ve started but will require a three month recovery. So here I am, at home, resting with a bag of ice on my hip. My femur bone is growing stronger every day and I’ll soon be exploring yet again. But, considering the unseen hazards of Lisbon, I may, in the future, do all of my exercise at the gym.
I want to thank my bevy of friends here in Lisbon who have provided both comforting meals and good company during my down time. This all may sound catastrophic but, luckily, I’m at an age where I can weather the storm. I also want to thank Mindi for stepping out of her shoes and into the role of shopping and house manager.
One last shout out needs to be given to the wonderful doctors and nurses in the Lisbon public health system. If you live here, public health is no joke. We insure privately, but in the case of events like my recent accident, public healthcare is provided free of charge. (We use our private plan to pay for preventative medicine and planned procedures like Mindi’s knee replacement surgery last year.)
The Portuguese healthcare workers, especially the nurses, conducted their jobs with a high level of dedication and professionalism during my unplanned hospital stay. I don’t know what they’re paid but their worth every penny and much more.
My surgeon Philippe was especially great - something I realized when we removed my final bandage a couple days ago to find a minimal scar around my hip. I really appreciate him making time in his busy hospital schedule to conduct my surgery within 24 hours of my accident.
Housekeeping Updates
Life goes on. We’re slowly easing back to normality by hosting guests who booked visits before my injury and dipping our toes back into the Lisbon restaurant scene. In fact, we ate a phenomenal sushi meal with our brother-in-law Brian during his brief visit. Also, note the following:
We mentioned some difficulties with the back end of our website in our previous newsletter. That’s been fixed.
We have a new partnership with Airbnb. Look for links on our website for both apartments and experiences. Booking with these links won’t cost you any extra and will make us happy.
We’ll be resuming a more regular newsletter schedule now that my injury has entered the recovery phase. Phew.
Dish of the Week
The food I ate at the hospital certainly doesn’t qualify as our dish of the week. In fact, that food was the epitome of bland since I somehow landed on the list for “sem sal” (salt-free) meals. So, instead, we’re highlighting one of my favorite Portuguese dishes - açorda.
We introduced shrimp açorda to visiting friends just before my accident. It’s a satisfying dish that combines flavors of the sea with flavors of the land. It’s also surprisingly cheap and easy to make wherever you happen to live.
Drink of the Week
I’m not drinking right now since I’m on post-surgery medication until Saturday. While I won’t be walking on Lisbon calçada any time soon, maybe I’ll celebrate that milestone with a Lisbon-inspired cocktail.
If I do, my choice may be the Amalia cocktail which is essentially a Portuguese Negroni. Then again, maybe I’ll opt for a Campari Spritz since it’s my favorite summertime sipper.
Links We’re Liking
Carlo Petrini, the Northern Italian who founded the Slow Food movement, died this week. Read the wonderful tribute written by food writer and former Times restaurant critic Pete Wells. | NYTimes(gifted)s
In a controversial move, the Michelin guide has decided to retire its Green Star rating. | The Guardian
Nat Geo compiled a clickable list of the 15 best places to eat right now. We could argue about their choices forever. | National Geographic
We warn all of our guests about the immigration queues at the Lisbon airport. Well, the situation has now reached levels bad enough to warrant CNN’s lead foreign correspondent Clarissa Ward’s attention. (We always joke that the last thing we want to see is Ward walking down our street with a TV crew so this was more than close enough for us.) } Instagram (CNN)
Until next time,
Daryl & Mindi
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Oh no Daryl! So sorry this happened to you. Glad you’re feeling better
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So sorry! Smooth healing and recovery to you!!