Three weeks ago I was in a wrestling class and someone hit the wrong finger at the wrong angle, and the bottom bone in my right pinky snapped.

"Did you know right away it was broken?" everyone asks, and I say that I don't really know. It's not like falling off a bike, where you have a moment to think: uh oh. It was nothing but a normal grappling move until the shock was done reverberating through me, and it wasn't anymore. 

I did know, right away, that it was bad. 

Anyway, it's still broken. That's my punchline, because it's been three weeks and people ask "how's the finger" and I have nothing to report except: "still broken!" Soon I'll go back and get another X-ray and know more, but for now: just this. Taping my pinky to my ring finger; washing my hair gingerly; apologizing for not being able to shake hands. I can't really open jars because, did you know, your grip strength comes from the pinky activating the muscles of the forearm? I can't do yoga because I can't put weight on it, but after the first week or so I could type and cook again. When it was still splinted I had a lot of trouble maneuvering to get the keys out of my car's ignition.

Three days after I broke the finger I was out in Palm Springs, staying in a house with a bunch of friends. I was sort of drunk and sitting around a firepit when my coach, W, texted me. How is the finger? 

I gave him a status update-- I hadn't been sure it was broken when I'd left the gym a few days before, but now I very much was. 

Nooooo, he replied. What the fuck. 

I assured him that it had broken because of a pre-existing condition (who knew bones just have cysts in them sometimes??? Not I!!!!!) and that I was treating it with mezcal and the swimming pool's chlorine. 

Come to the gym ASAP, he urged me. I'll show you some stuff to work around it. M and I were saying we need you!

And so, one week after breaking a bone I was back, slinging uppercuts and left hooks into the bag, my right hand curled into a half-fist, still-splinted pinky in the air like I thought I was at high tea. I still can't wrestle, but I've been boxing one-handed, and picking up strength and conditioning classes in the meantime, so that I won't be a total noodle whenever I'm finally ready to come back for real. 

People also often tell me that it's "badass" that I hurt myself wrestling, and I guess it sounds that way, but I was there, and it was just stupid. Wrong finger, wrong move, wrong moment. Being hurt is mostly fucking stupid and boring.  If I'm impressed with myself for anything, it's for being patient and flexible in the aftermath: for allowing this uncomfortable, unproductive fact about my body to be without getting mad at myself for it. Learning to work around it, work with it. To get thrown off track and not just sit there, stunned and seething, and then march myself back to 0 with grim and furious determination.

"I'm just mad this fucked up my plans," I kept telling the coaches the night it broke. I wanted very badly to hide the fact that I was in a lot of pain, and scared of it. But then, you know, I got up in the morning and asked for help. Sorry but: that was the tough part. That's the only thing in all of this that I had to be tough as shit to do.

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My first boxing class was a year ago today. In honor of that, here is a new piece, on the companies that make boxing gloves and combat sports gear specifically for the proportions of women's bodies. (And not in fucking pink.) 

And here's my essay on how I got into it, and my Atlantic piece on the gym-as-church phenomenon, for good measure. 

Also speaking of asking for help: my pal Tori has been working on the pinky to help it heal right, and I couldn't be more grateful. If you're in LA and looking for an acupuncturist / body worker, I highly recommend checking her out.