Kitty’s Kneecap Knock-Out

You may have seen her on campus in her shorts and on her crutches, but here Kitty Goodwin tells The Tab about her horrific Crisis injury.

Kitty: the shorts, the crutches and the leg brace

As part of Nottingham women’s rugby team kitty had just been out for their termly social: “We started pre-drinking at someone’s house, then we went to The Bag of Nails and then onto Crisis. It happened at about 12am and the floor as always was already really wet.”

According to Kitty, her current situation is “embarrassing enough and it really can’t get any worse” so she was very happy to tell us exactly what happened next…

“So I was just dancing and you know those times when you catch someone’s eye and you dance really embarrassingly with them…” Yes, of course we do “Well one minute we were dancing and the next this guy just did something crazy and hit my leg. I landed on the floor and he landed on top of me”

Kitty (far right) and her friends at the start of the night.

“I looked down at my leg and all these people started prodding it like they were some kind of physiotherapist knowing what they were doing. My fitness coach even told me how it was fine; I’d just have to miss a couple of practices”

It’s now more than 5 weeks later and rather than attending her rugby practices, Kitty is waking up at 6.30am every day so she has time to walk to the bus, and is spending her life “absolutely hating, more than anything else” those who queue behind her on the Hallward stairs…she’s too stubborn to take the lift.

So what exactly had happened? It turns out Kitty’s kneecap had been fully knocked out of place. “Like some kind of animal I literally just straightened my leg out and punched it back down as if that was the right thing to do.” Well, she does play rugby.

“I then lasted about 15 minutes before getting in a taxi.” Kitty’s housemate, standing at 5″2, helped the injured 5″11 Kitty into the house but the wounded girl couldn’t manage any further. “I just slept on the sofa because I couldn’t get up at all. I couldn’t get changed either so I turned up in hospital the next day in exactly the same clothes.” (The Tab confirms this included the same underwear).

“Don’t ask how, but we found some old school crutches in the garage and I dragged myself to hospital with them. The hospital was a bit of a nightmare though since the nurse hated me.”

Kitty ‘still wasn’t really taking it seriously at this point’

Unfortunately for Kitty, her clothes had to come off and on went one of those dreaded hospital gowns. “It had no back, and I had, y’know, ‘skimpy’ underwear on. There were 3 ambulance guys helping me, so I said this to the nurse thinking she’d help me but no…SHE TOLD THEM!!”

Kitty’s leg had been twisted so bad that she was at risk of permanent damage. She had to have an emergency operation but the worst thing was that she is “absolutely, completely TERRIFIED of injections”. So much so that she hasn’t had an injection since she was 7 – so all those jabs we require, which we’re asked about at the start of Uni? “Yeah I lied. It was a good idea at the time.”

“I had to have LOADS. All the ones I’d already missed; blood tests – loads of blood; those things they put in your hands; oh and some awful ones in my stomach.”

The operation required 27 staples and has left Kitty with a 5 inch scar. “But it’s not so bad; because it’s on my bad leg…thank god it wasn’t on my good leg!” 

See, we told you it was horrific!

“There are actually some perks though…a lot of good looking people offer to help, especially up and down stairs. I’ve also spoken to a lot more people than ever before as everyone seems to think it’s okay just to talk to me because I have a leg brace and wear shorts all the time.” (Guilty as charged…)

Girl to girl, it’s agreed that the worst thing is Kitty “practically endangering” herself every time she tries to shave her leg. Kitty had to buy herself a huge limbo (a leg condom, if we’re being honest) which stretches over her leg brace whenever she showers. “It was worth every penny” apparently.

Second to that are the shorts which have earned her a number of nicknames around campus. “I am constantly aware of what might be on show and the fact that I must not bend over. Wearing a skirt is particularly risky because I have no hands when the wind blows it up.”

But Kitty assures us “it could be worse. Much worse.”

Good luck with the rest of your recovery Kitty, best leg forward.