The emotional recovery from a trauma requires active work and community.

I’m just coming out of a depressive bipolar II episode. Let me share what it is like for you.

The exhaustion hit me last Sunday. I had gone for a 10-mile run with my friend Emily early in the morning. I honestly thought I was over my bipolar II depression. It had already been going on for close to two weeks, but I had gotten out on my mountain bike on Saturday and was very bubbly. Things were looking up. Emily and I did not run hard. We had the pups with us, so the route included a lot of water stops. I even took a gel. We had done this same run several times this summer at a faster clip and I hadn’t needed to fuel any of those other days. But I was being conservative, because I knew I was still coming out of an atypical depressive episode. When I got home from the run, I was EXHAUSTED. 

I am a cycling advocate. I am also a crash victim. I never want my story to overshadow the beauty of riding. Not for me, and definitely not for other potential cyclists. Below is my list of reasons why I love riding. I want to make this list a compilation of others ideas' too, so please send me any of your reasons that I may not have listed yet and I'll add them to this post.

There is a neighbor who lives a quarter mile from me who I met a year ago. She has a shy dog who likes to occasionally do sprints with Maybellene in the grassy park nearby. As any dog owner can relate to, I learned her dog’s name well before I could recall hers. However, I have seen her enough times on evening walks to confidently address her by name. For the purposes of this blog I’ll call her Ellie. Ellie is about my age, I know she has a partner and I’m pretty sure his name is Chris, but I’m fairly good with names and I think if I ever said, “Hi Chris” he would look at me sideways. While Ellie lives nearby, she is not in the same HOA and perhaps our proximity is not quite close enough to develop a friendship. But I have been thinking about my relationship to Ellie a lot recently.

This is a section from Chapter Six of my manuscript. It feels like an applicable share at this moment for multiple reasons.Friday night, day 7, was the scariest time I experienced in the hospital. It began with a new set of evening nurses who I didn’t trust. Irrationally, I thought they might do something wrong and I wouldn’t be able to communicate my schedule or needs with them. My parents had already left earlier in the evening but Kennett normally stayed with me each night until at least 10 pm. On Friday, I asked him to stay with me longer.

In 2014, it was estimated that people uploaded 1.8 billion photos to social media daily. Photos are a way we express ourselves and share our memories. Beyond the internet, photos are also a way people ID us. A prime example is our drivers’ licenses.

It has been five years since my crash and in that time I've met a host of new friends and acquaintances. Initially, people associated me with the newspaper articles written about the crash when they could see my relatively fresh injuries. More importantly, I think during the first three years, before I went to trauma therapy, I wore my PTSD on my sleeve where everyone could see it. 

There is nothing better than reading a good book chock full of interesting information that you can use as a conversation starter for the following week. It keeps me from gossiping and encourages me to think more deeply about the world. Recently, my reading list has included two excellent books by Johann Hari, Life is a Marathon by Matt Fitzgerald, and How Cycling Can Save the World by Peter Walker. This last book has provided me with my most recent antidote to share.

Today I showed up for a group ride called Wednesday Morning Velo that leaves from North Boulder. As the organizers reminded people to be safe on the roads, many people turned on flashing bike lights, (I did too, but I think I forgot to turn it off and it is probably still flashing on my bike in the garage now…), and we left town. Shortly outside of town I made small talk with another rider who asked, “Have you done this ride much?”

Bike to Work Day is a holiday in our household. It is not to be missed for workouts or appointments. Our excitement exists, in part, because winter Bike to Work Day was the first time my husband, Kennett, invited me to ride with him. He worked in the bike industry at the time, and his entire office met at Dushanbe Tea House early in the dark morning to take advantage of free chai, which Kennett's boss referred to as "rocket fuel."

Colorado is currently considered a Vulnerable Road User Bill. In March, I testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee. Since then, it has made it through the Senate Finance Committee, Senate Appropriations Committee, and Committee of the Whole Senate. Today it is being heard by the House Health Committee and I will go to Congress again with Triny (another cyclist who was hit in a crash after mine) to testify. Below is my notes for what I will say this afternoon. It isn't edited the way I would for my writing, but I think it important to share anyway.

Be skeptical of crash reports in local newspapers. The police officer giving the journalist a quote is often sitting in an office miles away from the crash scene. He or she is only getting second information from the on-scene officer who has yet to complete an investigation.

In this blog I want to stay at the crash scene because I think it brings home an important point — I wasn’t the only person who left that crash scene traumatized.

This weekend it was triathlete Matt Russell who was taken out by a driver during the Ironman World Championships and was hospitalized in intensive care. Earlier in the week Tim Don was struck by a driver while preparing for the same race and fractured a vertebrae. This summer there was a similar story involving an older gentleman who got hit a few miles from my house. Last summer it was a father of three children who was killed on that very same road while enjoying his Saturday bike ride. The more egregious stories are featured in the news and, while the circumstances change, the cyclist-being-hit headline has been used too often. Changes need to be made. Each news article does its best to report the physical injuries but the full scope of a crash cannot easily be described, which is why I am writing a book. Below is the first chapter. Today marks three years since my life was nearly ended by an impatient driver.