So, to say I've gotten a little behind in blogging is quite the understatement. School, work, life, post-surgery care have all been much more important to focus on than this blog. When I have any spare time, I'm trying to do PT or exercise or just RELAX! I also haven't had a lot of fun and happy things to report. My recovery is going much slower than I was told and I'm still having pain. The pain is pretty persistent in my groin, on the front of my leg where my hip and upper thigh meet, and my butt. I have been trying everything to help with the pain. Natural remedies, not so natural remedies, pilates, yoga, massage, you name it. AETNA, who are BASTARDS, will not give me any more PT sessions. My doctor prescribed more sessions, my PT submitted all the necessary info, but Aetna won't call my PT back, or even ANSWER THE PHONE. My PT has tried for months, and they've gotten no word back about more appointments. I'm pretty much disgusted by the whole thing.
A few weeks ago, my doctor sent me for another MRI. This MRI sucked in a few ways. First, the contrast shot hurt a lot more than I remembered. My knee felt completely locked and I hobbled for a good 5 hours after. Secondly, they did a crap job taking the images. My first MRI is so much clearer than this latest one. There's only one decent image of what's going on. As you can see there's a bunch of black crap around my labrum, which had me freaking out. My surgeon was worried too, so he took an X-Ray when I saw him a week after the MRI. He thinks that the black areas are the MRI's reaction to the sutures in my hip, because they have a little, very fine, bit of metal in them. I'm hoping he's right, though it did worry me that he was so nervous about it. I feel a bit assured though that that's what it is, because my boyfriend's father looked at the MRI images before I saw my doctor (he was an occupational therapist) and thought that's what the mysterious black areas were too.
After spending the money on an MRI and another doctor's visit, and the pain I went through to have the MRI, I was really hoping my doctor would have some answers. He didn't. "It could be this, it could be this, we know it's probably not this..." I was/am really disappointed. I want a name to call this pain. I want to just hear "hip tendonitis" or SOMETHING. But he doesn't want to make any decisions until he knows more. So I'm getting a cortisone shot next Tuesday, in my hip joint. I'm not really pleased about this, especially since I think the real issue is my hip tendon. I want that shot there, where my doctor was thinking of putting it before the MRI. I've seen two massage therapists and they both exclaimed surprise when they've gotten to my hip tendon/abductors. It's so tight, all the time, I stretch as much as I can. Some days I just want to rip my leg off. Both massage therapists have recommended tennis ball therapy, where basically, I put a tennis ball on my groin/hip area and hump a wall, rolling the ball up and down. It's really uncomfortable and I can assure you it's not as much fun as it sounds.
So that's where I am. Clueless. I realized the other day that this week a year ago, is when I felt the "big tear". I'm sure my labrum was beat to hell, but I definitely felt it completely go. I don't know what to feel about the surgery at this point. I'm sure it had to be repaired, 4cm just flapping around isn't going to heal by itself. But to still be in pain... it's really disappointing and it makes me worry I will never run again. Part of me has been preparing for that to be the reality of things. It's been hard too because I know if I had more time to do PT, pilates, yoga, tennis ball humping and other things that help, I would be in less pain. If I had more money I'd get massage therapy once a week. I hope to update more often, since it seems a lot of people on the Facebook group "Understanding Hip Impingement, FAI" (yes, there is such a thing) are experiencing similar issues. It has been a source of comfort to know that I'm not alone and that other people are out there, with this weird, pretty obscure, f**king annoying orthopedic issue.
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