On June 7 I was riding my bicycle home from the office as I always do. My bike commute takes me down one of the busiest corridors between Reno and Sparks and of course that day I managed to hit rush hour dead on. It was when I crossed a main street that I lost concentration while passing cars on the right while watching a car ahead that blocked my path.
My handle bar caught the right mirror of the car on my left and I went down very hard. I landed on my right elbow and came to a stop a few feet later. I got up and felt that something was wrong. I picked my bicycle up off the road and went to the sidewalk. Me left hand hurt a lot when I did that.
My right elbow swelled like a baseball but the real problem was my hand. X-rays showed a broken fourth metacarpal in my left hand. That's the bone between your knuckle and wrist on the ring finger.
A visit to my othopedic surgeon got me a velcro based splint that has allowed much more freedom of movement than a plaster cast.
When I got back to work a few days later, I felt like I could not work at all. Typing with one hand is extremely difficult for a 70wpm+ touch typist! I tried everything. I switched my keyboard layout to Right Hand Dvorak which is optimized for those who do not have the use of their left hand. RH Dvorak is good but requires you to start with a new home key set unless you want to stretch your fingers until they hurt. Within a short time I was nearly in tears with frustration and was about ready to send my keyboard to early recyclement.
Another thing I considered was a chorded keyboard for one handed use such as the Frog Pad. After much research and mediocre reviews for any of them, I settled on an older BTC non ergonomic flat keyboard that I already had here at the office. I kept a plain qwerty layout so that while less ergonomic, I would be able to type faster. So far it has worked well. I've adapted to one handed life fairly well, but a month later I find myself using my left hand quite a bit.
Monday July 16 I go in to my doctor again, this time to get this horrid splint off and hopefully to get the OK to use it fully. I'd at least be able to get on my bicycle again. This time around I'm taking a different route though!