Lameless… or Less Lame

I know you probably haven’t been sleeping well, wondering what’s going on with my knee so I’ll tell you.

Todd drove me to my appointment where I first saw the Physician’s Assistant. She pushed and pulled and I didn’t hit her. Surely I should get some points for that. I limped across the hall for x-rays, limped back and then waited for the doctor. When he arrived this was our conversation:

MD:  What did you do?

Me:  Well, you see, I was rock climbing…

MD:  Mmm-hmm.

Me:  In the Himalayas.

MD:  Yeah?

Me:  And there was, um…

MD:  A bear?

Me:  Yes! A bear!

MD:  Grizzly or brown?

Me:  I don’t know.

Todd: She was running away from the bear.

MD:  And she was faster than the bear?

Todd:  She only had to be faster than the person behind her.

Seriously, folks. That happened. And then the doctor pushed and pulled on my knee and I didn’t hit him, either. Lord knows I wanted to. As I was laying on the table being tortured, he and my husband were talking about knee injuries (Todd being an expert in the field due to his own injuries and surgeries). I swear to you Torquemada didn’t even realize he was pressing firmly on the most painful part of my knee. He was looking at Todd and talking while he was pushing, pushing, pushing… Finally I said, “That does not feel good at all. That pretty much hurts.” He ignored me.

Then he looked at my x-rays and said my knee was “lovely”. Which sounds nice, except the word “lovely” was drippy with sarcasm. The swelling is from fluid and there was an unholy gleam in his eye when he offered to drain it for me. That’s not a joke. He licked his lips and wrung his hands like a kid walking into a candy store. When I said “no, thank you,” I saw a flash of disappointment.

He thinks I’ve probably torn one, possibly both menisci, which may or may not require scoping. Of course, we can’t be positive until I have an MRI. So now we wait for insurance to say I don’t have to pay for the whole thing and then we’ll schedule that.

In the meantime I’ll just keep plodding along. I think the swelling has gone down a little bit because it doesn’t seem to be as painful today as it was yesterday. Then again, I don’t think I was on it as much today so who knows.

I will leave you with this photograph of a text conversation I had with a friend of mine.