I had my first visit with my now, very own Orthopedic Doctor today.
F4 picks up my children to take to the $1 movie so I can get to my appointment.
I start driving north to get to my appointment. I enter the address into my GPS in route. For some odd reason ‘her’ route is Woodman, which is just a traffic mishmash. I don’t know where I am going though so I listen to what ‘she’ says.
I get there, park, open the door, guide my leg out of my van and prop my right leg on the arm rest of the door so I can put the brace on that F3 has loaned me. Brace in place I hobble to my appointment. I reach the receptionist desk and they inform they have two offices and I am supposed to be at the other one.
R…”Do you still want to be seen?”
Me…”Yeah, kinda.” and I smile and wink at her.
R…”I’ll call them and tell them you are on the way.”
Me…”Thank you, Happy Holidays.”
I hobble out as fast as I can. I despise being late and making people wait on me. I find chronic lateness to be one of the rudest characteristics. I know it’s not my fault that I am late though so I release the hurry.
20 minutes later I get to the correct building and I meet an incredibly handsome older couple.
The Older Lady says to me…
…”Welcome to the party.”
Me…”Ha! It’s a party I didn’t really want an invite to but now that I have one I’m gonna make it the best party I ever went to.”
They both laugh and we all head to the same office as she and I discuss the importance of a very attractive purse on a woman’s arm. (I like her.)
I get to the receptionist area and they give me some forms to fill out. I peruse the forms and say…
…”Do I have to be honest about how much alcohol I intake on a weekly basis?”
Them…”I don’t think it’s as much as us, don’t worry about it.”
Thankfully that question was multiple choice.
I don’t finish all my paperwork and they tell me…
…”It’s ok, you have to tell the Doc everything anyway.”
The nurse comes in and tells me to put on these blue ‘short’s’ that are almost the same colour of the anterior of my knee. I tell her I put underpants on just for this special occasion. She laughed and told me
…”Thanks!”
The whole office is filled with pleasant people with great senses of humor….’cause it sucks when people don’t understand how funny I really am.
I have to get some X-Rays first.
The X-Ray Tech asks me if I am pregnant….You should laugh here…I did, almost to the point of hysterics!
She tells me to stand both feet together all the way up against this ‘thing’. It took about 2 min. for me to accomplish this task.
I then had to lay down on my side with my leg bent. I won’t lie this wasn’t pleasant.
I tell her…
…”I feel like such a hypochondriac. What if I’m just being a big baby and nothing is wrong?”
Tech…”We will find out.” But she said it with a smile like, ‘oh, girl, I have seen this before!’
With the X-Rays done I wait for the Doctor.
He comes in and is very personable. I like his bed side manner already. He has me lay down and takes my knee gently in his hands and starts moving it up and down…
Doc…”Relax.”
Me…”I’m trying.”
We had been joking and laughing up until this point.
Then he touched the inside of my knee so softly…yet in a place so tender that I ‘yelped’. That is the only adjective I can think of to describe the sound I made. Then I cried for the first time because the pain at that moment was unbearable. I say cried, I only let one tear out…refusing the Universe anymore than that. I hadn’t shed one tear, even when it happened I kept it together.
Doc…”I’m sorry.”
Me…”That’s ok. I can take it.”…and I could have as now I would be prepared.
Doc…”It’s like Mashed Potatoes in there. You tore your Medial Collateral Ligament (MCL) and I am pretty sure your Anterior Cruciate Ligament (ACL). We have to get an MRI to be sure but I can’t even find any thing remotely resembling your ACL. The part that hurt was where your MCL used to be.”
Me…”Ok, what do we do from here.”
Doc…”You start Physical therapy and get an MRI, that way I can be positive of the damage done. You need to be able to straighten out your leg and also bend it completely on your own.”
Me…”I take that as a personal challenge!”
He explains that after the surgery I will have a long recovery for what I would consider a light work out. Probably about 6 months of Physical therapy before I can just jog.
They fit me with a new bionic looking brace with hinges on the sides so I can move better.
I am so happy about this because I had pretty much been doing a one legged stair stepper up and down the four stories of my house with my left leg. I was really concerned my left ass cheek was going to get hard as a rock and my right ass cheek was going to waste away. Wheeeewww!!!! That was a close one!
Ahhh…vanity!:):):)
This is probably one of the most common sports injures. I know a few people that have had it happen to them. It’s not a big deal.
I’ll blog more about my cool appointments, don’t worry;).
Until then Ibuprofen, a couple of times a day as my knee is the size of a large grapefruit. Not for the pain, I can take that and frozen peas several times a day for 20 min.
Peas that I will never eat.
No comments:
Post a Comment