Epilogue

Every once and a while I look back on this blog to sort of re-visit this time in our lives (now more than 4 years ago). And every time I tell myself I need to close it out, as the story is left hanging after the surgery. If this story is new to you, please scroll all the way down to the first post and work your way up.

 All done? OK, here we go:

 Karen recovered from the ACL surgery (suffering through the agony of the CPM machine as required) and slowly resumed normal activities. The other injuries (most notably the cracked ribs and cracked vertebrae) have healed well and have not been an issue. She was back playing hockey about 1(?) year after the accident (she'll correct me on this after she reads). But her knee did NOT let her resume jogging until she found the right type of shoes and adjusted her stride.  She's been running regularly for the last year, completing several half marathons (more on that later).

She'll probably have to deal with knee issues for the rest of her life due to this, and some recent hip issues have been attributed to the accident by our orthopedist Dr Rollins, so physically, there will always be little reminders. 

 We returned to Maui in November 2010 for the sentencing of the man that hit her. He had pled guilty and we were told that, as a repeat offender, he was going to get a year. But the defense attorney threatened to pull the guilty plea and take it to trial (which would have meant we would have to make another trip back there who knows when for a trial). The DA left it up to us. This 61 year old man was really a bit of a pathetic person, not worth our trouble, and we knew something was going to be happening for us in about 8 months (see below).  So we said OK to the six month sentence to allow us to move on.  Karen gave a very strong-willed and emotional victim's statement, with a nice little ad-libbed jab at the defense atty for his little trick.  Story here: https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/72983740/maui%20news%20article.pdf

This trip for the sentencing was supposed to be a bit of a make-up for the vacation a year previous that got ruined.  We were there for a week - the sentencing took up one day, and the rest of the time (seemingly) it rained. Hard. 

Suffice to say: Maui owes us.


 A bit over a year and a half after the accident this happened:

Oliver came along to complete our family about a year later than hoped due to the accident, but it's worked out well. Riley is a great big brother and the boys get along beautifully.

Riley says he doesn't remember our Maui "vacation" (he was just 2 at the time). Perhaps that's a good thing...



So.  Remember up there where I said "more later" about her running regularly for the last year? Here's the more (and the impetus for finally closing out this blog). The new shoes and stride are working out pretty darn well because today this happened:

 That's her crossing the finishing line at the California International Marathon in Sacramento (center with arms raised).   Of course it took more than the right shoes.  It not easy to find the time to put in the training necessary to do this, while working and raising two boys.  I took care of the boys when I could (like during long weekend runs), but it also involved many early morning and late night runs during the week, or just having the dedication to fit a workout in somewhere. 

The chances that this could happen seemed so remote 4 years ago, but persistence and dedication can do wonders.  I couldn't be more proud to be her husband.

So that's it.  I'm not sure how many will read this last entry, as the accident is somewhat ancient history now, 4+ years removed from when it happened, but for those many friends (and strangers, in some cases) that helped us through this, I'd like to say thanks one more time.