It's a severe sprain

(This one came by snail-mail, two days after the injury)

Well, I’ve got a lot of time on my hands right now because of my hurt ankle. So right now I am spending the day with my foot up at a member’s house while my companion goes with another pair of missionaries. My ankle is pretty messed up! It’s all swollen and black and blue. Luckily the doctor gave me some pain meds, a brace and crutches. I didn’t think that I could use the payflex card on the crutches, but it turns out that I could have…

Being hurt/sick on the mission sucks. But I hope that some good will come of this. It’s weird because I have been hoping and wanting my companion to step up and be the senior companion and I think this will give him a good opportunity to step up as it kinda forces me to step down. It’s pretty humbling because you are forced to depend on your companion and the members. Sitting around like this kills me though, because I feel so unproductive.

And it makes me miss home, especially just being able to call Mom and ask questions if I need to. It’s frustrating but it will all work out, I know it will.

My only two concerns were 1) Having the injury effect the remainder of my mission and 2) Having it affect me throughout my life. I think it will all turn out alright though. I’m not too worried about it all. Well, I’ll be sure to keep you posted.

Dang, I can’t believe it’s already been almost 9 months!
I’m glad to hear that the brothers are doing good and I can’t wait to talk to you guys Christmas morning.

Well, I love you guys and miss you tons.

Love,

Elder Britton Winterrose

P.S. So yesterday I gave in and let a member take care of my ankle fa’a Samoan (the Samoan way). In Samoa, they are a culture of warriors - pain for them is weakness exiting the body. And they don’t have ice, so rather than sitting around and using passive and cold to reduce swelling, they massage the painful, swollen, areas vigorously and use lots of heat to basically break up all the bad blood, and then the heat helps to move it away. Now this, I originally thought. was just a few Samoans who wanted to mess with me, but literally every single member has asked me the same question, “Did someone pop it yet? Did someone massage it for you?”

Long story short, I didn’t want to look like some sissy-white boy. I know that people would just keep asking me till I caved. I figured that it is part of the cultural experience, and I had had like 60 people tell me the exact same thing saying that it would help me heal five times as fast. So I was spending the day with Bro. Sua’ava and I finally built up the courage to do it. (Oh and knowing that nothing is broken helped me decide to try it…)****AND IT HURT SO BAD! ***** He handed me a pillow and was like, “Here you’re gonna want this to scream into.” And once he had my food he wasn’t about to let go. Imagine your very worst sprain pain and then imagine someone grinding their knuckles into that tender spot. Honestly though, I think it helped, like it helped a lot. I’m still in pain, but it’s not as painful today. I have to do it again tonight, and tomorrow, but we will see how it looks and feels.

Well, I love you guys!

Talk to you soon!

Elder Winterrose