I Don’t Know What He’s Thinking ~~~

No matter what I do when I follow every rule to the letter, I still end up in an empty corner shaking my head in wonder.  Maybe it’s the “invisible” thing.

I went to the knee surgeon last Thursday, limping and with my cane, and first his assistant, Shea, comes in and he’s all aglow with, “Ohhhh, so good to see you!” Then he asks how I am and my answer was, “I honestly am not sure.  I am still in pain and still limping, and my knee is much warmer to the touch than my other knee, AND the pain is all the way up my leg just shy of the groin area”.  He says, “Have you ever had any problems with blood clots?”  I answered no, and that was the end of that discussion.  Then he says for me to walk for him without the cane.  I hobbled and dragged my achin’ leg and he said, “Ohhh, I see you have quite a limp there”.  I said yes, and the pain is still there, in my knee as you can see the swelling, down to my ankle, the back of my calf, the back on my knee and up through the thigh like I told you a minute ago. To even try to press on those areas almost takes me through the roof.”  He tells me to sit down and then starts pressing hard around my knee and calf. I was not quiet and he says, “That hurts?” What is the matter with these doctors?  Then he got up and said, “Great to see you, and Dr G will be coming in.  You might want to think about having a cortisone shot….”, and I said, “WAIT, you’ve already given me a number of them the last few months and nothing helped.  You can’t keep doing that.”  He thinks a minute (they never read your chart) and then says maybe physical therapy will help and to talk to Dr G. 

Dr G comes in, “Great to see you!”  I am so sick of that phrase by now, just fix me, but I nod and say nice to see you, too, BUT, I am still in pain, still swollen, still limping, and the pain is not only in my knee but……blah blah blah.  I pin him down to the question of, “Could this still be the Levaquin that is causing it?”  He returns to square one like he’s never heard that I had that problem, yet the MRI showed it plain as day.  All he says is, “Hmmm, maybe we should think about a cortisone shot and then if that doesn’t work, maybe physical therapy”.  Don’t you know I wanted to shoot through the ceiling.  I said the same thing again to him about already having an allotment of cortisone and he glances at my chart --- just a glance --- and says let’s try physical therapy.  I asked again about the pain throughout my leg and his answer now just dropped everything to physical therapy, and he said, “Tell the physical therapist where it hurts”.  THEN, he hesitates and says, “Did we xray your hip? Maybe it’s your hip!”  I said, “Hell NO, it is NOT my hip! It is my leg as I keep telling you and telling you.” Guess what he said. “Well, the next time you come in, if the pain hasn’t stopped, we’ll get an xray of your hip.” The insanity never stops. It is not my hip and I will not do the xray. I really wanted to say to him, “Is that buck you’re trying to pass heavy?”  But….you don’t get on the bad side of your surgeon.  Then he stood up and said, “Great to see you;  I’ll see you again in 3 weeks”,  and he left.  Me?  I was now sitting in an empty exam room.

I got myself up, hobbled out and across the hall to the physical therapist business. The girl there was really nice and when she heard I’d been some weeks out of surgery but only now being referred, she was a bit on the surprised side to say the least.  She set up the “soonest” appointment she could which is this coming Thursday.  It’s given me just enough time to debate if I want to even do it.  I can’t take even more pain and I’m positive that Levaquin is playing the part of the pain in the rest of leg, up and down.  I think the knee pain is only the healing taking longer and that would be due to my age.  My surgeon is a sports doc and he deals with all these super young jocks who heal in 48 hours from everything.  He forgets he’s looking at me…..I’m invisible, remember…..and only once has alluded to the fact that “as we get older, we take longer to heal”.  There are moments I think he’s trying to kill me.

And so today, I am icing my knee and leg like crazy, taking Aleve and doubling the dose, watching the rain which I’m sure makes bones and muscles hurt more, hearing the weather report of severe storms beginning tomorrow and through Wednesday night with even the likelihood of tornados, and weighing my feelings about Thursday.  I’ve decided that by early Wednesday morning I will either keep the appointment or cancel it for now.  Yes, my surgeon is passing the buck, and for some reason I feel antlers growing out of my head. As I pass by the  mirror, I see that I am that buck and I’m sort of sick of being passed around.  I didn’t even realize that bucks could be invisible like we seniors are.  Maybe when I see him next I can give him a little bit of hoof in his shin as I smile ever so brightly and say, “Great to see you!”

For now, resting, icing, trying to get in a better frame of mind, and will blog walk when I can sit without throbbing. Pfft.  I didn’t sign up for all this mess.

                                      

The day after my appointment, Mary had gallbladder surgery, so I was at the hospital with her all day and then picked her up the following day and took her home.  She’s doing well, thank goodness, but now we look like Dumb and Dumber walking down a hall.  She holds her side and I limp.  What a pair.