Saw the specialist today (the same specialist/surgeon who did some complex surgery on my mom's ankle near her Achille's tendon several years ago).
He confirmed the imaging lab's report of a complete anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) tear and a meniscal tear, so I'll be having a patellar bone/tendon graft on FEBRUARY 4th to replace the trashed ACL, and cut/shave off the torn portion of the meniscus.
I chatted with a gentleman several years younger than me (that or he proves the "Men age better than women" adage) who was in for his 10 day post-op checkup for the exact same procedure I'll be having. He was honest about the pain and reliance on others for simple tasks, basically reiterating what I've already learned from the first couple days after my injury -- this is temporary disability, and you see the world in a whole new way when you are among the disabled for a bit. His surgeon is the same as my specialist/surgeon, and his comments went a long way to bolster my general impression of the Dr. (in addition to my mom's experiences). When I finally met with the specialist, his bedside manner is top-notch -- he was having a hectic Monday, with all appointments running 1-1.5 hours behind schedule due to an emergency surgery he was called in to, but once the exam room door shut he was totally focused on me. The rest of his staff was the same, including a number I can call with any questions I have anytime before my surgery.
So, here we go gang. ACL replacement and meniscus repair. Not exactly on my list of desired accomplishments for 2005, but that's the breaks.
Surgery is at 7 AM on February 4th, and my first followup appointment with the surgeon/specialist is on February 14th (Valentine's Day -- just realized that.) No physical therapy required pre-op, since it's a total tear it's apparently less important than if we needed to strengthen what's there to help make the surgery and rehab go smoother. I will have physical therapy post-op, but that won't be lined up until my first post-op checkup.
If anyone's in the S.A. area, I highly recommend the
San Antonio Orthopaedic Group, and
Dr. Jesse DeLee in particular, though he is the most sought after physician and can at times be difficult to see (not with a torn ACL and meniscus, apparently; they actually were ready to see me on January 19th but I wouldn't have had my MRI films in hand in time to share them so I postponed to the 24th, today.)
Send good thoughts, good vibes, prayers and high fives. I'm not (too) worried, but it can't hurt.
And I have no intentions of this sidelining my forays into backpacking -- in fact, all my new backpacking gear is still in full view downstairs as a daily reminder of my goals.
I'll keep posting minor "I'm still here" updates to this thread, but for the details and all, I'd like to refer folks to my personal website,
GeekHabitat.com, so I don't flood WildTexas.com with this stuff. Especially if I get the desire to share my pain by posting post-op photos.
So, my "knee adventure" related blog entries on my personal site can be found here:
http://geekhabitat.com/topics/wellness/knee-health/