Kvetching

So, I've been dealing with knee issues for about 3 years now. For the most part the issue has been that my knee cap lay slightly to the outside of my knee and I had inflammation that would come and go in my knee. I think these issues all stems back to an injury I sustained when I worked on the Intensive Unit at an Emotionally Disturbed Children’s Home and had an extended take-down :(. And since this all started recurring 3 years ago my family practitioner, my orthopedic and my spinal specialist have all been telling me that if I would just lose weight and strengthen my quad to pull my knee cap back into proper alignment all of knee issues would go away. HA!

Well last June when I stepped on the scale on my 40th birthday and realized I was at my heaviest ever I knew it was time to do something. So I started being more aware of what I was eating and I managed to lose approximately 15 pounds over the summer. Then toward the end of July a knitting buddy wanted to join Weight Watchers and asked me if I wanted to do it with her. I knew that support would be my greatest ally on this journey, so I agreed and we joined and we go every Monday night. I feel this starts my week off on a good note and keeps my in-line over the weekend because I know I have to weight in Monday!

Then school started back up and a co-worker talked me into joining the same gym she goes to and that she would work out with me. Now, I HATE, absolutely HATE working out. But again, I knew and workout partner would get my fat ass to the gym and she would be yet another great support on this extensive journey of mine. I joined the gym and since August we've been working out together. I now go the gym anywhere from 4-6 days a week. We do cardio on the elliptical and lift weights on the nautilus machines. (But let me tell you, if medical reports came out tomorrow that said “You get absolutely NO benefit from working out I’d stop in a heartbeat!) We would walk/run on the elliptical for 30 minutes and when we first started she was running almost 3 miles in 30 minutes and I was lucky to just make 1.5 miles on level 1! Now, I've managed to work up my endurance to 5 miles within 45-55 minutes on level 8!

Back in October, my knee was really starting to feel fabulous. I’m talking, I could run up and down stairs with no pain what-so-ever. I was even able to wear heels again! (Yes, I have a shoe fetish and have been holding on to all my pretty heels because I was determined to one day be able to wear them again!)

Then in November my workout partner wanted to change up our routine a little and we started taking some of the classes that were offered at the gym. We decided to take a Zumba class. I was really looking forward to it. I had danced for 15 years growing up and still love too, so I thought this would be something that would make me actually enjoy working out. We took the class and I had tons of fun and felt fabulous when the class was over. The next morning however, my knee was not :(. It swelled up like an overstuffed sausage and I was back to wearing my brace. High was quickly deflated. My knee has been temperamental ever since that morning. The swelling would come and go, but it never felt as good as it did just before I took that Zumba class. I tried Zumba 2 more times while wearing my brace and not bouncing as much, but I haven’t been back to a Zumba class since Thanksgiving :(

So, I started wearing my brace whenever I went to work out. Then two weeks ago I was home and changing to head to the gym. I put my brace on and headed upstairs to grab a towel. Each step I took and straightened my left knee it popped. Not a painful pop, but not something my knee normally does. I thought that maybe I had put the brace on wrong or too tight, so I took it off, threw it in my gym bag and headed to the gym. I put the brace back on in the locker room and tested it out. Nope, knee still not feeling right, so I took the gel piece out that suppose to aid in pushing the knee cap in the proper position and just wrapped my knee. That seemed to work and I was able to run my 5 miles with no problem, or so I thought!

That night I was at a friend’s house because we are taking this online class together and twice that night my knee locked up on my while I was sitting on the couch and when I forced it to straighten it popped and hurt. When I got home, I iced it took 2 Aleve and went to bed. The next morning my knee had swollen up again and I called the orthopedic. Due to my knee locking up, he ordered another MRI to check my meniscus and to compare it to the MRI I had done back in 2008 to see if I had torn it more.

Sure enough that’s exactly what I did. The doc thinks this happened from Zumba, but that was a little over 2 months ago. On the same note, I can’t think of anything else that I did that could have torn my meniscus.

Now I need to have knee surgery to repair the meniscus and I’m hoping that while they’re in there, they can fix those other pesky issues with my knee as well. I don’t have a surgery date yet, but I’m going to try and schedule it for his first opening as I don’t want to wait too long and run the risk of tearing it worse.

So, despite all the doctors telling me to lose weight and all my knee issues will go away, I’m almost 65 pounds lighter and my knee has never been worse!

As if that wasn’t bad enough – my mother thinks I can fly down to Florida after the surgery to recoup and let her take care of me! Can you picture this – knee bandaged up, crutches, sitting in coach and the damn service cart coming by and hitting my knee?? What is my mother thinking?? *le sigh*

OK, kvetching over with…