This coming Monday, a significant chapter in the saga of my comeback from a catastrophic knee injury will come to a close. I’m scheduled for surgery on the morning of November 23rd to fix issues with my kneecap and my quadricep tendon, remove scar tissue, and take out the nine screws and two plates installed on November 14th, 2008 to artfully and ingeniously restructure my knee.
These days, it hurts when I go up or down stairs and generally when I push off of my right leg with anything more than the effort needed to walk. It is possible that after this surgery my pain will lessen, if not entirely go away. But I’ve learned how to live with a certain amount of general pain in my leg, and though I’d obviously be happier without it, I have other priorities.
My main hope is that after this surgery I will be able to jump, jog, and run, if not as powerfully or quickly as I once could, at least functionally. Right now, the act of starting to run or jump results in nerve-rattling pain and my knee buckles. Essentially, there is a final measure of progress in my rehabilitation that simply isn’t possible with all of the hardware and scar tissue gumming up the works. So, I can’t help but feel like I’m approaching a moment of truth. After giving my body about one month to regenerate bone mass, it’s possible that I will be able to run around a little, which would be the outcome I’ve been working towards since starting my rehabilitation in February.
Possible? Probable? My surgeon isn’t saying. The only certainty is that leaving in the hardware limits my recovery potential. So, I’m going for it, come what may.
I have faith that I’ll be running around in 2010. Faith not of the jumping-to-conclusions-that-make-no-sense-based-on-revelations-that-make-no-sense variety, but faith of the ‘confidence and optimism’ sort.
I am so very ready to start a new chapter.
