Weekend Update
I'm still at Inova Fairfax Hospital as I write this. There is so much going on in the world that I have thoughts about - the special election in Massachusetts (it's going to have nationwide repurcussions and so it's beyond unfortunate - but anyone who runs for office saying "there are no terrorists in Afghanistan" and runs for office IN MASSACHUSETTS by dismissing former Red Sox WS hero Curt Schilling as "a Yankee fan" is an idiot ... and richly deserves her ignominious fate. The nation is going to have to live with her ignominious fate, there's the rub. I'd have voted for her, but not for HER, and I get why a lot of people in MA decided against giving her any actual power beyond party apparatchik), the horrible tragedy in Haiti is just heart rending, and the boring but VERY important Supreme Court decision that a corporation (a legal fiction created to promote certain kinds of commerce), is equivalent to a flesh and blood citizen and is similarly endowed by the Creator with inalienable rights ... it's breathtaking in its cynicism from a court that allegedly honors stare decisis and deplores activist judiciating. But then again these are the weaselly mendacious slime that used a rationale (Equal Protection) in awarding the Presidency while dropping a footnote saying "oh, only for this case - equal protection doesn't make us do anything we find distasteful"). In the long run that case is likely to be far more damaging than the MA special election - and if the Democrats in Congress would actually, you know try to govern that wouldn't have much affect at all.
But I digress. I'm much more personally familiar with my own pain & melodrama right now. And there is a little more to go on as to what is causing the hip pain. My original fear was that I'd have this blinding pain and nothing would show on the tests - leaving open the impression that either I'm crazy or lazy. Now we have a conspiracy of three: the CT scan showed an impingement and some damage in the joint, one MRI showed a tear in the labrum, and another MRI shows that I have a herniated disk in the lower back pressing into a nerve canal. The abundance of problems at least explains the pain, although it will complicate treatment (more on that later). But it's not all in my head - it's in my hip :-)
We may never truly know how or why this happened, but I've been aware of some hip pain over the past several weeks. At first it wasn't much and I easily ignored it, but it gained in duration and intensity and so the week before last I went to my regular doctor. She referred me to a hip specialist, who I saw a week ago yesterday. He took x-rays and ruled out degenerative arthritis (which was my secret fear). He told me to load up on ibuprophen and gave me some stretches to do. I did them once, Thursday night. When I awoke on Friday I couldn't walk at all. We delayed the rail tickets for our long-awaited NYC trip while trying a phoned in prescription of Vicodin, but when that proved ineffective we had to reluctantly cancel. My "holiday weekend" became a weekend of enforced bedrest, with occasional attempts at walking proving to be sheer agony.
The doctor's office was closed Monday for the MLK holiday, but I was on the phone to them first thing Tuesday. They said to come in, but if I couldn't make it that i had to go to an ER to find out what was going on. Despite having crutches picked up by eilonwydreams and my BIL stepping up to help me, I wasn't able to get any farther than the 25' or so from my bedroom than the living room. Off to the ER for me. Getting an ambulance was harder than I thought it would be, but 911 would get us to the nearest hospital, and for a variety of reasons (not least a much nicer ER) we were determined to get to Inova Fairfax. Once here even the ER Docs were impressed by how stubborn my pain could be. Not one but two shots of dilaudid together with other meds had me feeling GREAT - as long as I stayed on the gurney. As soon as I tried to stand, the pain ripped right through the meds like they weren't there. After attempts at mobility with a walker and a wheelchair (putting weight on my sit bones causes great pain, so I can't even really sit up) I was admitted to the hospital and the testing (the MRIs were both pretty painful) began.
So, now what? Well, I may not get back to work until a week from Monday. First thing is to get the pain under control. Right now I'm transitioning off of morphine onto percocet (I'm only hitting the morphine to get me through physical therapy at this point). I'm on steroids to try to take the inflammation out, and also massive ibuprophen. I'm also getting nightly stomach injections of lovenox, which is to keep me from having blood clots from the lack of movement. Yesterday I actually took 15-20 steps with a walker, which may not sound like much but I only managed three the day before so it's really great progress. I need to establish basic mobility before they can let me go home. A spinal injection is tentatively planned for Monday to try to ease the herniated disc. Hopefully PT can address the other hip issues. Although there may be some surgery necessary if that doesn't work, it would be arthroscopic surgery, no hip replacement is going to come of this.
Bottom line: I may not be able to play baseball this summer ... but I will play baseball again :-)
Again, eilonwydreams has been magnificent in all of this, and I've been really appreciative of how supportive my work, friends and family have all been. Onwards and upwards!
But I digress. I'm much more personally familiar with my own pain & melodrama right now. And there is a little more to go on as to what is causing the hip pain. My original fear was that I'd have this blinding pain and nothing would show on the tests - leaving open the impression that either I'm crazy or lazy. Now we have a conspiracy of three: the CT scan showed an impingement and some damage in the joint, one MRI showed a tear in the labrum, and another MRI shows that I have a herniated disk in the lower back pressing into a nerve canal. The abundance of problems at least explains the pain, although it will complicate treatment (more on that later). But it's not all in my head - it's in my hip :-)
We may never truly know how or why this happened, but I've been aware of some hip pain over the past several weeks. At first it wasn't much and I easily ignored it, but it gained in duration and intensity and so the week before last I went to my regular doctor. She referred me to a hip specialist, who I saw a week ago yesterday. He took x-rays and ruled out degenerative arthritis (which was my secret fear). He told me to load up on ibuprophen and gave me some stretches to do. I did them once, Thursday night. When I awoke on Friday I couldn't walk at all. We delayed the rail tickets for our long-awaited NYC trip while trying a phoned in prescription of Vicodin, but when that proved ineffective we had to reluctantly cancel. My "holiday weekend" became a weekend of enforced bedrest, with occasional attempts at walking proving to be sheer agony.
The doctor's office was closed Monday for the MLK holiday, but I was on the phone to them first thing Tuesday. They said to come in, but if I couldn't make it that i had to go to an ER to find out what was going on. Despite having crutches picked up by eilonwydreams and my BIL stepping up to help me, I wasn't able to get any farther than the 25' or so from my bedroom than the living room. Off to the ER for me. Getting an ambulance was harder than I thought it would be, but 911 would get us to the nearest hospital, and for a variety of reasons (not least a much nicer ER) we were determined to get to Inova Fairfax. Once here even the ER Docs were impressed by how stubborn my pain could be. Not one but two shots of dilaudid together with other meds had me feeling GREAT - as long as I stayed on the gurney. As soon as I tried to stand, the pain ripped right through the meds like they weren't there. After attempts at mobility with a walker and a wheelchair (putting weight on my sit bones causes great pain, so I can't even really sit up) I was admitted to the hospital and the testing (the MRIs were both pretty painful) began.
So, now what? Well, I may not get back to work until a week from Monday. First thing is to get the pain under control. Right now I'm transitioning off of morphine onto percocet (I'm only hitting the morphine to get me through physical therapy at this point). I'm on steroids to try to take the inflammation out, and also massive ibuprophen. I'm also getting nightly stomach injections of lovenox, which is to keep me from having blood clots from the lack of movement. Yesterday I actually took 15-20 steps with a walker, which may not sound like much but I only managed three the day before so it's really great progress. I need to establish basic mobility before they can let me go home. A spinal injection is tentatively planned for Monday to try to ease the herniated disc. Hopefully PT can address the other hip issues. Although there may be some surgery necessary if that doesn't work, it would be arthroscopic surgery, no hip replacement is going to come of this.
Bottom line: I may not be able to play baseball this summer ... but I will play baseball again :-)
Again, eilonwydreams has been magnificent in all of this, and I've been really appreciative of how supportive my work, friends and family have all been. Onwards and upwards!