Surgery

Have you ever had to have surgery?  I mean any type of surgery.  If you have, then you know that there is a lot of preparation that goes into it prior to actually having the surgery done.   I had to have surgery on my hip; my left hip. 

I woke up in excruciating pain one Sunday morning and had no idea why. I swore someone was stabbing me with a pitchfork. They were standing over top if me in my bed just repeatedly stabbing me. Of course no one was there and the only way i knew this for sure was the fact that i had no holes in my hip and there wasn't any blood. I got out of bed and looked around my room, looked in my bathroom and even called out some hellos to see if someone was there.  Again, there was no one.  Pain, I tell you, just massive pain.  I have no idea where this came from, but all I know is that I wanted it gone and at that very moment.  

I took a cool shower hoping, oh heck, I have no idea why, just hoping the pain would leave.  It didn't disappear, but lessened ever so slightly.  I took some Tylenol and tried to go back to sleep because it was around 4am.  I woke back up at about 6am and just paced until I could call someone to bring me to the emergency room.  I am not the type to call you at 4am or even 6am to bring me to the ER.  I waited until almost 10am before I started making calls.

Finally after three or four phone calls my one friend said just call your doctor and see what they tell you to do, after all it is Sunday morning now and you will only sit in the ER for hours and be referred to anther doctor anyway.  Umpf!  So true she was.  I called my doctor who was on-call and she told me to go to the ER anyway, because she wanted to to have a cat-scan first.  The staff at her office was on-call and would take at least an hour to get there and the hospital had all the right equipment in place already. 

Off I go, well after my friend came and picked me up of course, I wasn't driving anywhere.  I get the the emergency room and holy crow, I realize I just want to go back home, lmao.  I don't like going to the hospital, does anyone?  I will cut through all the extra and tell you that a cat-scan and a few x-rays were taken, well besides a hip being all messed up, I have three kidney stones and an enlarged ovary with three cysts on it.  Well, bust my britches!  This is why I dislike doctors and hospitals.  Did I need to know all that?  Am I going to die?   Is my body going to explode from the inside out now, damn new technology.

The ER sends all my records to my primary doctor and gives me whatever for the pain, ok, it made my head spin, but my hip...the pain was just overwhelming, nothing was touching that.

Monday morning, my doctor calls me to tell me the great news, haha, kidney stones, complex cysts on your ovary and there is a bone island on your left hip.  Huh?  A bone island?   Do I have water, houses a palm tree maybe?  What the heck is a bone island?  

The referring begins.  First she said, oncologist.  Are you kidding me?  OK, she wants to be sure.  Now I'm scared and holy my whole life flashes I'm scared.  I went through this crap in 04 and 05.  Freaking really!?  I'm just thinking to myself, shut the hell up mind, stop wandering and do what they say you are fine.  She tells me go see your gyn and the oncologist and this week.  I make my appointments and off I go.  I had a hysterectomy in 2004 and we decided to leave in my left ovary for hormonal purposes.  So far well, so good.  I go see my gyn and of course a bunch of testing starts, blood-work, all the bells and whistles.  If you are a woman and you have had any of the testing, I mean look at you in depth testing, you know what I mean when I say, isn't there another way to not be so invasive.  After a week or so of that, everything was good, cysts disappeared, and that was back to normal.  This happens to me quite often as well as a lot of women so I hear and  my heart goes out to you also.

Now I am finally at the oncologist and he wants to know why I am there.  I'm looking at him with the wtf in my eyes.  I just say to him, I was referred and smile.  He explains to me that this bone island is an anomaly and it could have been there for many years.  The reason it was found was because of the cat-scan and they came across it by incident.  Hmmm, well ok.  So why did I get referred to him?  Just to be sure he says, I want to send you for a full body bone scan.  This is just getting ridiculous I was thinking to myself.  I have some island vacation resort in my hip, found by mistake but you want to fun a full body test to see if I might have cancer?  Are you covering your own ass or do you see something you don't want to tell me this early in the game?  Or is it an insurance plug?   Whatever it is, now my head is spinning, because my hip has not hurting, I limp when I walk and I need a peace in my own mind.  Off to get a full scan.  Thank goodness I have insurance at this point.  

In the meantime, I was referred to a hip specialist who wouldn't take me until the gyn cleared me, which was now done.  I get the full body scan and go see the hip specialist the same week.  Lots of tests and MRI and x-rays along with the best exam I have ever had.  Let me just tell you the pain, I hurt more when I was done than I did when arriving, but Dr. Tomlinson was great.  He showed me the results ad went over everything before I left the building.  I have a labral tear in my left hip, there is debris in the joint as well as the iliopsoas muscle being impinged.  My hip was moved forward almost a quarter inch because of this.  We no wonder the pain and limping.  He wants me to go to therapy first and see if this works.  I was in physical therapy for six weeks, no change, just pain.  We opt for surgery.  I had the surgery for a labrum tear and an impingement.  I had surgery August 15, 2011 and it was amazing.  I was back in therapy the very next day.  On the bike for only two minutes, but the doctor didn't want my hip to seize.  I went to therapy for eight weeks then another six weeks.  I still limp to this day, but that massive pain is gone. 

I am feeling good now, and my hip is still gives me a little pain from time to time, but it's not an artificial one.  I had to have all the debris removed as the doctor put it, lol.  Hmmm, garbage in the hip, now thats a good one.  It only gives me a problem if I over exert myself or of course if it gets cold and damp out, then its just a stiff achy feeling.  I would never put this pain on my worst enemy, even though I don't have any, well none that I know of.  It was the worst pain I ever experienced in my life prior to having the surgery, well next to having the brain surgery.

I feel as if its a never ending process in my life.  People who continue to get sick I do feel bad for because I know what they go through all the time.  I feel worse going through the motions rather than the illness at times.  Just keep your head high and your attitude up you will be fine.  Be positive no matter what the situation, be happy and you will be healthy.   Stay away from the negative, it does't do you any good.


Below is (his surgery photo and a link) Alex Rodriguez, Yankees third baseman, whom I adore by the way, from the NY Daily News (thank you).  This was the exact same surgery I had done, so I know what kind of pain this man went through, as well as recovery time and rehab for the hip, not easy!  

http://www.nydailynews.com/sports/baseball/yankees/a-rod-successful-hip-surgery-expected-return-mid-july-article-1.1241528