May 26, 2017

Craig Dickenson is counting his blessings

in CFL action between the Saskatchewan Roughriders and the B.C. Lions on Saturday July 16th. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Rick Elvin

Craig Dickenson is more than ready for the CFL off-season to be over.

The Saskatchewan Roughriders’ special-teams co-ordinator always is eager for football season to start, but his 2016 off-season was more trying than its predecessors.

Dickenson, 45, suffered a broken neck and other injuries in a car accident over the winter when he was visiting his brother, Dave, and his family in Calgary.

Craig spent 13 weeks in a neck brace, and he used that time to reconnect with friends and family. It also gave him a chance to realize just how good things are for him.

“Anytime you have a traumatic event happen, you learn to appreciate the little things a little more,” says Craig, whose team opens training camp Sunday in Saskatoon. “Things like feeling good. Being able to get up in the morning without being sore or cramping up. Being able to work out and do some exercises again. Being able to ride my bike again.

“Being able to run around on the field is going to be fun because I haven’t been able to do that for a while. I can’t wait to get in front of the guys and be back to my normal self.

“When I had that brace on, I still was active, but people look at you a little differently. It’s not that big of a deal, but it’s nice to walk into a room and not have everybody ask you what happened.”

•••

The accident happened on a country highway west of Calgary.

Dickenson was returning to Dave’s house after a day of skiing when the car he was driving collided with another vehicle at an intersection.

Subsequent medical examinations revealed that Dickenson had fractured his C7 vertebra and had torn the medial collateral ligament in his right knee. As well, he may have done some damage to his right shoulder but, as he puts it, “the verdict’s out on that.”

The driver of the other car also was able to walk away from the accident with relatively minor injuries.

Dickenson says the medical attention he received — from people at the scene, the responding paramedics and the staff at Calgary’s Foothills Medical Centre — was exemplary. Doctors at the hospital deemed that surgery on the fractured vertebra wasn’t necessary because they felt the displacement would heal on its own.

CAT scans determined there wasn’t any damage to Dickenson’s spinal cord or to the arteries leading to his brain. If the cord had been affected, paralysis could have resulted.

Dickenson knows he’s lucky he wasn’t paralyzed, but he tries not to think about that outcome. That said, he has pondered some alternatives.

“Part of me is like, ‘If I had left two minutes earlier or 30 seconds later, (the two cars) would have been ships passing in the night,’ ’’ Dickenson says. “At the same time, I’m not a big believer in ‘It was meant to be’ or ‘Things happen for a reason.’ I just think that things happen.

“If you’re lucky enough to survive an accident, then you should be thankful. But if it hadn’t gone that way and I was killed, well, I’ve led a good life. It would have been short, but I’ve led a good life.

“People say, ‘You’ll live differently (in the wake of the accident).’ No, because I try to enjoy what I’m doing, enjoy each day, try to be good to people and try to have as much fun as I can in life.

“This won’t be a life-changing moment for me. I’ve had a great time up until the accident and I’m going to have a great time from here on out.”

•••

Doctors put Dickenson into a cervical thoracic orthosis neck brace that he had to wear 24/7 for 13 weeks.

Because of the brace, he had to learn how to eat without being able to tilt his head.

He couldn’t shave for the first few weeks because the brace was up to his chin.

He had to wear it in the shower.

And he had to sleep in it.

“You basically have to sleep flat on your back or in an inclined position, so I ended up propping pillows on a bed — or I’d sleep in a recliner,” Dickenson recalls.

“It was good practice for being an old man because I took a lot of naps. I couldn’t really sleep for more than a couple of hours. If I was in the same position for that long, my back would start to seize up on me.”

But the brace was a necessary evil for Dickenson. If the doctors had told him he needed to wear the contraption for a year, he would have done it with minimal complaining.

“When the doctors tell you that you have a fractured neck, all the little things — like the knee injury and the shoulder — don’t matter,” he says. “It really puts first things first for you.

“You say, ‘OK, that’s kind of a big deal. Let’s make sure we get that right. Then if I’ve got to do rehabilitation on my shoulder or my knee down the road, I can get that done.’ ’’

•••

Wearing the brace meant that Dickenson couldn’t drive himself home to Montana, so he lived with Dave during the early stages of his recovery.

That turned out to be one of what Craig calls “the unintended benefits” of the accident.

“It wasn’t the off-season I expected, but it was still worthwhile for several reasons,” Dickenson says. “I was able to spend a lot of time with my brother and sister-in-law and their kids. I got to watch (nephew) Cooper play hockey seven or eight times and I was able to watch (niece) Avery play soccer. I don’t normally get to do that, so that was great.

“Then, when I came back to Regina in mid-January, I was able to start work. I just dove in, got really involved in the draft, watched a lot of film and made a lot of phone calls. I felt like I was more tuned into the draft than I’ve ever been and it was because I was here for most of the off-season working on it.”

Roughriders head coach-GM Chris Jones isn’t at all surprised that Dickenson threw himself into his work as quickly as he did after the accident.

“He’s a tough guy and a determined guy,” Jones says. “He’s somebody who’s not going to let something like that keep him down.”

Dickenson is grateful to his co-workers for their help and support after the accident and during his recovery. That includes Roughriders co-ordinator of football operations Scott Annand, who acted as Dickenson’s chauffeur while he couldn’t drive.

“It was like Driving Miss Daisy,” Dickenson says with a grin, “but I was even harsher than her: ‘Hey, what are you doing? Go this way!’ ”

Eventually, follow-up X-rays in Calgary and Lethbridge determined that the vertebra had healed properly, so Dickenson was able to shed the brace.

That allowed him to be a hands-on participant with special-teams drills during the CFL’s national combine in Regina in March and during the Roughriders’ mini-camp in Florida in April.

Now, with the accident a distant memory, Dickenson is ready for training camp — and for the 2017 campaign.

“I’m really excited for this season because I feel like last year we didn’t play up to our standard or coach up to our standard,” he says. “I felt like we underperformed all the way around.

“This year, I’m looking forward to getting back to playing winning football. Personally, I’m highly motivated to do a good job and really get the guys rolling.”