Up until recently I had absolutely nothing in common with 24-year-old Montrealer and Canadian national soccer player Ismaël Koné, who fractured his leg on June 18 during a match against Qatar at the FIFA World Cup.

Those of us who saw the gruesome injury shuddered at images of the unnatural angle of his lower left leg after he twisted it, fracturing both his tibia and fibula.

I didn’t know it at the time, but less than a month later, I would experience the same open (compound) fracture. I, too, now have a titanium rod inserted down the length of the tibia to stabilize my bone fragments, and I fully expect to set off airport metal detectors for years to come.

Unlike Koné, my injury didn’t happen in the middle of a high-level international athletic event, but rather on a mundane Sunday afternoon on the South Shore. After decades of playing competitive sports, and hiking some pretty challenging mountain trails, I somehow managed to break my very first bone in the most........

© Montreal Gazette