The Failure Continues

Well the failure continues... There's been no exercising in my house for a week now.

I saw my family doctor on Thursday who said he didn't know what was wrong with my knees but didn't think it was the patella-femoral anymore and thought it was something worse. He also said they were going to set me up with an MRI and that I should stay on the crutches.

Well the pain hasn't been getting any better. It's been getting progressively worse every day.

I haven't been letting on to people how much pain I have been in. I've tried to brush it off, act like nothing's wrong and that it's not a big deal. Meanwhile I've been in the worst pain I've had since I had my ovarian cysts. 

It all came to a head on Tuesday night. I tried to have a shower and could barely bend my knee enough to get my leg over the side of the tub to get in. Even just standing there was agony. I had lost the ability to put any weight at all on my knee and the pain was absolutely intense. I can't get away from it. It hurts if I lay down, hurts if I sit, if I stand, if I try to walk.. 

Even the pain is the oddest thing. On the right side of my cap it feels like someone's poking a huge needle into it and moving the needle around. On the top of my cap it feels like jello moving around but every now and then someone tries to poke the jello. On the actual cap itself it feels like constant grinding. It's so hard to describe.. but let me just say it hurts like heck.

So anyways, Tuesday night I finally broke down. I burst out crying from the pain and couldn't stop crying for over a half hour. Those who know me should know this in itself is a huge deal. I don't cry easily, especially from pain. I've always had the "stiff upper lip" thing going on. So I lost it for about a half hour. Dad finally told me that we were going to Pan Am Clinic first thing in the morning. I of course objected, saying that I couldn't miss work and that it was sure to fix itself soon.

I lost that debate.

So off to Pan Am we went yesterday. We didn't have to wait too long, only about 4 hours. 

The doc took x-rays and they showed a normal cap which was good news as far as I was concerned. He said it wasn't great because it meant something else was wrong. He made me lay on the bed with my leg flat, which had me biting my lip to keep the tears away. He felt it, jiggled it and poked around a lot.. the whole time I'm sitting there crying from the pain and in all honesty trying not to pass out. 

He said that it is the pattella-femoral and that I'm having a bad flare up. He said there's no surgery they can do to fix it (although I'm sure knee replacement is an option down the road as it has been bantered around before). He said that this is going to happen since PF is not curable. 

He told me that there's no point in my ever trying to wear a knee brace as my knee cap is far too small (it is tiny..) and the brace would have nothing to grip onto. 

So he sent me off with a prescription to celebrex to try for a week and some pain pill that supposedly is good for people who can't take tylenol 3. I can't take T3. They don't do anything for the pain. This doc was saying that supposedly 20-30% of the Caucasian population don't have the enzyme to break down the codeine in T3s. I guess I'm one of them. 
He also told me to elevate and ice the knee 5 times a day.

Then came the really bad news.

I have to be off work for a week. Most people would celebrate having to be off work, but I love my job. I also am one of those people who can't sit still and do nothing or I feel guilty. So taking a week off is basically torture to me. I've already volunteered to do some work at home if need be.

The other really bad news is I had to get rid of the crutches. Saying goodbye to the crutches isn't all that bad, but trading them in for a wheelchair is.

Yep. I have to be in a wheelchair for a week. 

I'm not allowed to put any weight on my knee for a week. 

So there goes any exercise plans. Well, at least I can get some sort of upper body work out seeing as I have to pull myself around in this damned chair, but it won't be enough! 
I don't even know if I'm going to be able to work out much if this thing ever dies down. I really don't know what the future holds. It all depends on how this week goes. If it dies down, then great I can probably get back to it. If it doesn't, then I have no idea what's going to happen. 


This is just killing me. I'm normally a very active person, not physically but just running errands and being busy. I like to keep busy, it gives me a sense of purpose to life. Now I'm forced to sit still and do nothing. ARGGGGG! I'm already itching because there's things I should be doing but I can't. At this exact moment I should be at work but I can't be. The windows in this house need cleaning, the fence needs chicken wire on it so Bailey can't get out, I have pants I need to go get hemmed, I want to change my cell phone provider but I need more info... 
There's things to do and I can't get them done! Driving me insane.. driving me insane!


I have to stop thinking I'm Superwoman though. I have to slow down. Even with being on the crutches I was still trying to do everything I did before. I was massively overdoing it. I was trying to downplay the pain to those around me. I never  like to admit when I'm in pain. And I don't like to bitch about being in pain either. Nobody likes to hear that kind of stuff. So basically, everybody knew I was in pain already, so why dwell on it, why say "Oh it's getting worse, I think the pain is about a 25 on a 1-10 scale". Bitching about being in pain doesn't help it or stop it, so why would I. 
I tried to do too much. I still cooked dinner, played with Bailey (though it was modified playing), went up and down the stairs, did errands.. acted like nothing was wrong other than I had to deal with these stupid things shoved up my arm pits. I now know I was stupid. I have to actually start listening to my body, and when it starts screaming at me instead of screaming back at it telling it to do what I want it to... I should listen to it and rest. 


I actually shocked my dad with how limited my range of motion was and how much pain I was in. I don't think he fully understood until we got to the doctors and the simple act of the doctor laying his hand on my knee without even putting pressure on it, caused me to cry out. 


So the failure continues..


to hopefully be replaced by a full recovery and a restart at all this..