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Motorcycle Safety and Awareness
Welcome to think bike, the podcast about all things motorcycle and the voice of motorcycle safety and awareness in Alberta. Your host is Liane Langlois.
Liane:Hey, everybody. Welcome back to another episode of think bike. This week, I am joined by Kacey Moon. And while that name may not mean anything to a lot of people, it will soon. And it's an Instagram page that I really think everybody should be following because, that's where I found her and cannot wait to get into her passion for riding and the challenges that have been overcome.
Liane:Welcome to the show, Kacey.
Kacey:Thank you. Thank you so much for having me. It's good to meet you.
Liane:Happy to have you here. So we're just gonna start simple. Who is Kacey Moon, and what got you into riding?
Kacey:So I'm Kacey. I live in the Dallas area in Texas. I have a brachial plexus full avulsion injury, which means that my right arm is fully paralyzed. I do spend most of my time riding or working on my motorcycle. And I got into motorcycling from the desire for adrenaline.
Kacey:I used to longboard down hills. But in the Dallas area, there's not really a whole lot of elevation to work with. And so I had to figure out a new route to go in order to get that adrenaline pump, and there's no better way than motorcycles. It's something I'm deeply passionate about. I love everything about it.
Liane:Yeah. It it definitely shows through your Instagram page for sure. Where are some of your most favorite places to ride?
Kacey:So I like to ride on the back roads a lot. We call them twisties. I tend to take my time. I do like the idea of going up to the track, although I haven't been able to make it out to a track just yet, but it's in the works. But most often, I like to do short rides to and from coffee shops and spend some time in the parking lots and do some cone days, get used to the motorcycle and how it moves at slower paces.
Kacey:And other than that, I like to spend some time
Liane:in the garage. So you mentioned in part of who you are that you have one arm that is fully paralyzed. So how did that happen?
Kacey:So I was hit by a car when I was making my way home on Christmas night of twenty twenty three, and it was the classic no yield left turn. And so I was moving straight in the intersection, and a car from the oncoming direction was making their left turn. And they basically pulled in front of me, and so I collided and t boned them. And essentially, what it did the major injury that's present today and is permanent is the brachial plexus avulsion, which essentially just means that the nerves got ripped out from my spine. And so there is no nervous signal to or from my brain.
Kacey:And so I have no motor and no sensory function in that arm.
Liane:Do you remember how that, like, how that collision happened? Like, do you remember being in that moment and, like Mhmm. Or was it blacked out and then you woke up in in a hospital?
Kacey:I did black out. Consciously, I blacked out and woke up in the hospital a few days later. I guess they had put me under. According to the paramedics and first responders, I was conscious at the scene. But, obviously, I I must not have been very aware of what was going on, and thank God for that.
Kacey:But, yeah, I woke up later on in a hospital surrounded by my friends.
Liane:Were you on a motorcycle in that collision? Correct?
Kacey:I was I was on my r three. I had Christmas lights on it and everything. Oh, yeah.
Liane:Hard hard to miss Christmas lights coming down the street. It's really amazing that left hand turn scenario. Just in just boggles my mind, especially if you're fully lit up. I'm assuming you were wearing pretty much all your gear at the time as well.
Kacey:Yep. I had my first pair of leather pants on. I had my boots. I had gloves. I had a chest protector.
Kacey:I had, of course, the helmet. Mhmm. And those things, they did save me. They did quite a lot to to protect me, especially in the chest area.
Liane:So laying in the hospital, you wake up and surrounded by love, which is amazing and and a lot of support. Long did it take you to realize your arm was paralyzed?
Kacey:So I kind of knew something was up with the arm. I just didn't know what it was just yet. They hadn't told me. It took them about two weeks to tell me that I had a brachial plexus injury and that I wouldn't be able to use my arm. The doctor called it slail arm.
Kacey:In those two weeks, had both my arms were broken, and they hadn't done any surgery on them yet because they needed me to stabilize out of critical condition. But my right arm, it felt strange. So I was laying down in the bed, and it felt as though I had my arm up on my chest, as though it was laying on my chest. And any time that I would reach to touch it, it wasn't there, of course. And from there, I realized that I couldn't really tell where the hand was if it wasn't on my arm.
Kacey:And yeah. So just kinda left out in the open and then come to find out two weeks later, they it was they called it flail arm.
Liane:So when they found out or when you found out that that was going to be a permanent injury for you, did you think you would get back on a bike again?
Kacey:Yeah, Pretty much pretty much in the hospital bed. I was already looking for ways to to make it happen to to see if it was possible. Mhmm. I didn't immediately rule the idea out, but I was in the in the middle of looking into that, but also looking into heavy, heavy research on the injury itself to try to kinda get more of a baseline for the reality of the situation and understanding that, obviously, if I were to get back on the bike, I'm at, like, an exponentially increased risk for myself and, of course, for other people around me if I were to do it. But I was still in the hospital bed when I was thinking about it.
Kacey:So that's
Liane:how much the writing means to you. Yep. That's what I mean. It did. It just like I was so captivated on your Instagram and I'm like, gotta know more about about this young lady.
Liane:How old were you when you had your collision?
Kacey:I was 28. And how old are you now? I'm 31.
Liane:So it's just a few years ago. Do you have any flashbacks of that? Sorry if that's a tough question, but
Kacey:Not a tough question. That's okay. No worries. So it's a little strange to to try to explain it. I don't have visual flashbacks, but I get, like, the the body tingles.
Kacey:I get kind of sick to my stomach, and I kinda if I so much to spend maybe a couple seconds trying to remember the scene, I get very, very strong sensations as though it was happening again, you know, like the typical post traumatic type of thing. But I you know, the body reacts, and it gets kinda clammy and things like that. But it it took me a long time before that feeling was something that I could settle with and explore a little bit. But thinking back on it, it's really not that that tough anymore. I think time time has a lot to do with things like that.
Liane:I think time and overcoming challenges probably helps as well. So let's let's talk about that. So you're laying in the hospital and you're trying to figure out what you could do to get back on a bike. What ended up being the solution?
Kacey:So the solution was obviously a lot of the main components for controlling it are on the right side of the bike on the right handlebar. So you got the throttle and of course the brake. Luckily, my legs were otherwise fine. It took them a minute to find an a knee injury. But generally speaking, my legs were fine.
Kacey:There was a bike that I was already planning on getting. So the initial plan was to keep the r three, take that to track, and upgrade to the ZX6R for the street bike. And the thing about the ZX6 is that it does come with a factory quick shift, which somewhat eliminates the need to use the clutch in order to move through gears. You do still need it to go from a stop and to to come to a stop. So, essentially, what I needed to do was work out how to reroute the right handed controls over to the left hand handlebar.
Kacey:And then everything else was as as it was stock from the bike, which is what I was going for. I wanted it to be as close to normal, as close to stock as possible before I started to make any further modifications. And so luckily, in my situation, all I needed to do was move the front brake to the left handlebar and move the throttle to the left handlebar, which means rotating the throttle tube and reversing the throttle cables so that it has it pulls backwards like it does normally on the right hand side. So that's that's essentially everything that was done.
Liane:And then I think I saw there's, like, two levers on that side, but one's shorter than the other. Which one is which?
Kacey:The shorter one is my clutch lever, and that's the one on the top. And the bottom is the Brembo brake lever for the front brake. That's just a personal preference. I've actually seen a good number of other one armed riders who do it the opposite direction. They have the brake on the top and the clutch on the bottom.
Kacey:And for me, that blows my mind. I'm just so used to the way I have it now. But that's so so far for me, that setup is perfect. I didn't need the thumb throttle or anything like that, although it was an option on the table if the throttle tube didn't work out. So like I was saying, I was trying to keep it as close to original in stock as possible.
Kacey:And luckily for me, I found that sweet spot pretty quickly.
Liane:Why was that important to keep it as stock as possible?
Kacey:Well, because it's it's a very severely devastating injury to to cope with and to accept. And writing meant so much to me already by that point. It was about a year after I started writing that it happened, and I was already kinda latched on. And the idea that I couldn't even use my throttle arm anymore, it didn't sit right with me that I would have to kind of give up anything about it, let alone change everything about it so that if I were to get back on there, I would have to change it, and it just wouldn't be the same. For some reason, that's just how my head was thinking about it.
Kacey:And the way that I am, I I tried to spend some time whittling out the options before I kinda take them away. And so keeping it as close to stock was financially smart, I guess, in a way. And then it also helps me to get back to some level of normalcy, which helps me cope with the injury.
Liane:So Absolutely. What were the thoughts of your friends and family when you're like getting back on that bike?
Kacey:So I don't have family. My friends, they were as happy as I was about it. They wanted it to be a decision that I made for myself and only for myself. And so when they saw and understood that that's what I wanted to do, They were full force behind it. They were excited about it.
Kacey:They were there to help me relearn in whatever way they needed to be. And that that made a huge difference at the beginning of it.
Liane:Yeah. That support can be everything. Like, that's a big game changer. What kind of struggles have you had to overcome getting back into riding as like a one armed bandit?
Kacey:So you might assume it would be a lot of it in the mental realm of getting used to things again and not being afraid. But for me, most of it was the physical struggles. So you have, you know, you're one arm down, and I've got to carry it on my chest to keep it out of the way and to keep it restrained in the case that I do fall. And so that added weight on the torso makes it a lot more difficult to activate the core and keep balance, which, of course, we're on a motorcycle, so we need to stay balanced to some degree until it gets moving. And so I think coming to a stop and super slow speeds for me were the absolute hardest hurdle for me to get through.
Kacey:And because I had to relearn how to move my body to compensate for that so that I can maintain the balance that
Liane:I needed. Well, I'll tell you, I'm horrible at slow speed skills and I have like all my limbs. I'm the worst with low speed. I watched a video of you. Okay.
Liane:So there's this whole thing out there about guys who sit there and say, well, girls shouldn't buy that bike because it's too heavy to pick up and that they drop it and blah blah blah. And it's like, no one understand there's physics behind this. It's not a brute strength thing. And this was the video that made me want to know more about you. Can you tell people about your determination to learn to pick up your own bike?
Kacey:Yeah. So I've always had the idea that if you have a bike, you're gonna wanna be able to pick it up by yourself because, you know, you might be riding by yourself. And what are you gonna do if you do drop it? And that that idea has kinda carried through to this, and it was even more of a forefront thought for me now that, you know, I've only got the one arm. So I thought for a long time, how could I even do that?
Kacey:It seemed like something that I wasn't capable of anymore. And that that kind of was a very discouraging thought for me. And so I started to brainstorm a lot of different ways that I maybe could make it happen without the arm, possibly like some kind of jack or pulley or some kind of external tool device or something like that. But then I realized that that's also a little bit of a dependency, and I would need to have those with me. And so the first thing that I wanted to wheel out was the idea that I physically cannot do it with just my arm.
Kacey:And so I had my friend go out there with me to a parking lot that wide out in the open, nobody around. We laid the bike down nice and gently. We didn't let it drop. And so I essentially just kinda sat sat down there and grabbed the bar and tried whatever way I could to to pick the bike up and brace my core, try to put all my force into the bar and push it up against the tank. And luckily for me, I got my knee under there just a little bit, and that was just enough to push the bike up.
Kacey:And once I started picking it up, I got so excited. And I've I I can't even express to you the feeling that you get when you thought something was absolutely not possible. And then you do it. It it blows your mind. And I think that was a turning point for me as as far as when I'm riding out there.
Kacey:I don't have to worry about having somebody with me at all times to make sure that they can pick the bike up if I drop it. And I don't have to worry about the embarrassment of dropping the bike and being stuck in. No. Can someone help me? You know, I I
Liane:just I love the idea that I could do that now and I'm I'm so proud of myself for trying that. I it just like it puts all those guys that say all those things about like girls and bikes to shame honestly. Like you just dispelled every myth and I had this like because the way that you presented that video was frustration through the process. And then you could see you trying to figure it out. And then when it happened and I was like, oh my god, that's amazing.
Liane:Like, I was so proud for you and I don't even know you. And that's like, it's insane. I just feel so like, I feel connected on like a girl power level, but a rider level as well and just overcoming challenges. What has been kind of the response from people that see you out riding and realize, you know, what you're all about.
Kacey:There's a mixed bag. Of course, like with anything else, any other social group, you're gonna get a good spectrum of of opinions. But the overwhelming majority has been positive, positive and respectful. And a lot of them have reached out to me directly to let me know that what I'm doing is helping them in their own ways or possibly they've got the same injury now or some other similar injury, maybe they're in the hospital and they're just down on their life right now. And so I get a lot of that feedback.
Kacey:And it's been overwhelming for me on my own journey because coming back into the social media, I really enjoy making content. I really enjoy sharing it. I do it for myself. I just like the the entire process of editing and then, you know, having fun in in in all the ways that it takes to make the content. And so when I made the return back to to Instagram, I really thought I was just gonna get bombarded with, like, derogatory and hateful, spiteful comments.
Kacey:Why are you doing it? You know, like, from all the people that can't comprehend why someone would want to do it, let alone why they would. But luckily for me, I don't think it's the same for everybody, but I think luckily for me in my situation, it has been overwhelmingly positive. But even the negative, I think it's a little bit fun to just kinda keep doing what I'm doing and doing it well enough to know that I can stand on my own two feet and and be happy about it.
Liane:Yeah. Absolutely. We had a gentleman on last year who was in a collision in his Jeep and in the wintertime and lost both legs below his knee and, spent some time figuring out how that was gonna work because same same as you riding was a huge passion and he's got, a Harley soft tail with zero modifications. He just it's it's exactly how it is. He just has his his his fake legs, his little legs on there.
Liane:And and, I mean, he uses a heel shifter because that's easier because you have no bend in an in an ankle, but he has no modifications like no out of the box modifications.
Kacey:That's incredible.
Liane:Yeah. Another friend of mine was in a collision quite a few years ago. Same scenario as you left hand turning vehicle, and he lost his, one of his legs below the knee and same with you before he was out of the hospital within a week, he figured out what he was going to do and got himself a trike and went back out on the road and everybody's way of getting back there is different and not everybody can do it. Mhmm. But the reason I wanted to talk to you was because like you're young and you're inspirational and you've got such a great story.
Liane:And maybe there's somebody out there who's on the fence of can I or can't I? Right? Mhmm. So there there is like, there's a lot. How do like, what do you do with your gear now?
Liane:Like, it's it's just the weird questions are gonna come out of me now. Like, I mean, I would imagine you get your arm into your sleeve and then sling it up, or do you what, like, what do you do?
Kacey:Yeah. So I'll just put my gear on like normal. I'll just have to feed my arm through the gear sleeve. And then once it's in that sleeve, I'll just put the sling on like normal. It's it's gotten a lot easier.
Kacey:It was difficult at first to get used to, but I can fit. I actually made a a modified Velcro attached sleeve to wrap around the sling on the outside of the sling so that I can actually fit my leather gear inside of it and fit a glove inside of it as well. So I've I've actually made an adaption so that I can I can wear all my gear, and I don't have to worry about anything on that arm?
Liane:That that's pretty cool. Okay. I'm gonna ask you a question that I think might be tough, but you said that there are no tough questions. Is there a medical reason why they decided that you having your arm still with you was better?
Kacey:On their end, they have actually not made much of any discussion about that with me, at least. I think on their end, they wanted to leave it up to my discretion to make that choice. And it just hasn't gotten to that point yet. And the the concept of functionality is a little bit different when you have a situation like mine. So I can still use the arm's dead weight as a function.
Kacey:It's just a different kind of function. And it helps to regulate the normalcy of appearances and wearing garments, clothing, things like that that I wouldn't have to modify because I still have the arm. And so I think at this point right now, the the idea is I'm just gonna keep it until I pretty much get tired of it.
Liane:Yeah. I think it's kinda like you want your bike to be as stock as possible. So you want your body to be as stock as possible
Kacey:as too. Right? Like It can be difficult to to come to terms with seeing your body in a different way. Yeah. And other people, they don't have as much of a choice as I'm lucky to have.
Kacey:And I just I don't think that I'm I'm quite there yet to to accept my body in that way without the arm. That's not to say it won't happen one day, but, you know, it's in the future.
Liane:Well, as long as the decision is yours and hopefully it will remain in your control for what you're ready to do when do you have any advice or lessons that you would want our listeners to hear about your experience and everything you've overcome?
Kacey:I think the first thing that comes to mind is patience. I think the world can use more of it. Every single person in it could use more of it towards themselves or towards anybody else that they experience in their lives. Be be patient with yourself. Be patient with other people.
Kacey:There are unseen things that are going on in everybody's mind and everybody's heart, and it takes a little bit of grace and a little bit of patience. And it can make the world a difference. Other than that, I would say reality is highly malleable. It can change any minute for any number of reasons. So don't take it for granted what you have now.
Kacey:But also consider that you might be in a little bit of a bubble. You might be a little bit in a safe zone and that there's a whole world outside of that safe zone and bubble. And if you just allow yourself to experience something new without fear or maybe keep the fear and work your way through it, I think you'd be surprised at how much more you'd be capable of and how much more everybody else around you is capable of. And that on its own patience and understanding and things like that. I think that that can make a world of difference.
Kacey:I
Liane:love that you're 31 and you're so wise. I absolutely love that. Like thank you. Thank you for that because we are living in a world right now. That is a little chaotic and patience and Grace is at the top of the list.
Liane:Very much top of list. Kacey. Thank you so much for taking some time for me. I cannot wait to continue to watch your content for our listeners. What what is your Instagram handle again?
Kacey:My Instagram is one down dot six thirty six.
Liane:The number one. Right?
Kacey:Yes, ma'am. Yep.
Liane:Number one down dot six three six. And I promise you, it'll be the best follow that you have and bring you perspective of pure joy that we all need to see.
Kacey:Thank you so much. Thank you guys for having me here.
Liane:You're very welcome. To our listeners, hang tight for the mixed bag.
Bryn:Hey, riders. Time for another helpful hint from Moto Instincts. Here's Kirk.
Kirk:Ride your own ride. Group rides are a blast, but the most important person to keep pace with is yourself. Never feel pressured to keep up with a faster rider or mimic risky behavior just to fit in. If the group is pushing beyond your comfort zone or breaking the law, back off and meet them at the next stop. A real riding community respects your limits.
Kirk:Ride your own ride at your own pace every single time. Stay safe out there. I'm Kirk from Moto Instincts.
Liane:And that's it for another episode of Think Bike hosted by me, Leanne Langlois, produced by Bryn Griffiths at Mighty Mouse Communications. If you have an idea or a question for the show, reach out to info@ab-amss.org or find us on all the socials. Always remember to ride smart, ride safe, and think bike. We'll see you out on the road.