November 6, 2007

Hines Ward and BBM: Two Peas in a Pod

I had an appointment with my surgeon this morning. Before I went, I fully expected this post to be announcing the date of my surgery. I won’t be doing that. It’s not because I’m afraid the papablogzi would track me down either. It’s because, at least for the time being, I’m not having surgery.

The MRI confirms the diagnosis of a torn ACL, but my surgeon thinks that I never had much of an ACL to begin with, and for 32 29 years my knee has done just fine. He feels very confident I will be able to PT my way back to normal. I asked him why I’m having the instability and pain when I extend and bend my leg and he said that he feels confident that when I hyperextended my knee while sparring, I irritated my knee cap. He went on to describe how it feels when your kneecap is all ticked off at you, and that is exactly how I’m feeling. He told me to take anti-inflammatories three times a day, crutch it around until that knee cap calms down and then the instability should go away and I should be able to walk.

Tomorrow, I start physical therapy. I will have a month of PT and then I’ll meet with him again. If I’m no better, then he’ll do surgery and reconstruct my ACL. I asked him what his gut was telling him about me and he said, "I really think you’re going to be able to rehab it without surgery." He even smiled. I’ve never met a surgeon who had a personality before, but he does and I like it (His good looks don’t hurt either). Am I right or what?

I reiterated that I don’t want to just be able to walk in a straight line, that I want to go back to karate and do it the way I did it before (Mr. BBM added here that my karate is hardcore-not Karate for Kids-ish), and he nodded with understanding and stuck to his guns.

He said he’s a surgeon and he likes to do surgery; but he does not believe I need it and doesn’t want to do it unnecessarily. I asked him a ton of "what if" questions and he answered everything to my liking. He said that if I do need surgery, he’ll be able to get it on the schedule quickly, that I won’t have to wait long to get on the road to recovery.

I am going into PT with a really positive attitude. I am going to bust my butt to get better without surgery. If I do end up needing to have surgery, I’ll be in great shape for it from all the PT beforehand. He said that he wouldn’t do ACL reconstruction surgery before things calmed down in there anyway, so this isn’t delaying my recovery by trying PT first.

I’m going to be the girl who comes back without needing surgery, and then Hines Ward and I are going to sit down and discuss our freak-of-natureness over drinks and nachos.