My Knee

Before I even start I am going to warn all of you that there will probably be some major mis-spellings in this post because of the medical terms I will be using.

When I was in 8th grade I decided with a little persuasion from some friends to join the track team. I only raced in sprints because I am not a long distance runner at all. Occasionally I would practice the hurdles but I was never very comfortable with them. One afternoon towards the end of the season myself and a hurdle decided they did not like each other and my knee paid the price. I couldn't tell you exactly what I did all I can remember now is that my knee was in a brace and I was on crutches for about a month.

In high school my knee would bother me every once in a while. Mainly it would just ache when the weather was changing or a storm was coming in. I was able to run, dance, and do all the normal teenager stuff without any problems from my knee.

Over the past 10 years I have noticed that this same knee hurts more and more. I'm sure having two kids and weighing about 30 pounds more than I did back then has not helped me. It also probably hasn't helped that I have fallen on this knee a few times since then as well. The past year has been particularly bad. I struggle most nights to get up the stairs without being in pain and I might as well forget about running or jumping because that is for sure going to hurt. Of course this hasn't stopped me from doing these things from time to time. :)

So for the past few months a few of my friends have been going to this free aerobics class at a local community center and they have been trying to get me to go with them. I had been putting it off because I know that my knee can not handle anything high impact and I really wasn't sure about low impact either. I finally broke down and went last Thursday. I stood in the back of the class with the older women and only did very low impact during the 30 minutes of aerobics. By the end of that 30 minutes my knee was burning and starting to swell yet I had barley even broken a sweat. I stayed and finished the arms and ab workout which I loved because I could do those without any restrictions. By the time I made it home that evening my knee has swelled to the size of a cantaloupe and I could barley walk. I came straight in the house grabbed the adjustable wrap ice packs Dave has for his shin splints and put them on. I also took some Advil to help with the pain and swelling. When you looked at my knee you could tell it was filled with fluid because of the way it had swelled. After many 20 minute on 20 minute off sessions the swelling did start to go down but I knew it was going to hurt the next morning, what I wasn't prepared for was it hurting 3 days later.

Since it was still bothering my Sunday evening and my sister was here I decided to have her look at it and see what she thought. She did a few things and then she had me lay on my back with my good leg straight out and then she lifted my bad leg and had me relax it. She then started moving and bending it. At one point she bent it towards me and turned it in at the same time and I was micro seconds away from kicking her in the head with my good leg. It hurt so much I can't even describe the pain to you. I am not the type of person that will yell when feeling pain but I do tense up and Steph instantly picked up on this and stopped. Before she could even ask if that had hurt I was able to get out a "don't do that again or I will have to hurt you". From what she can tell she believes I have a torn meniscus and based on what she knows I probably did this a long time ago and it has just gotten worse over time. Of course she told me I need to go to the Orthopedic so they can do some x-rays and determine for sure. If she is right, and she probably is, I would need liproscopic surgery to fix this issue.

As much as I would like to get this taken care of it will have to wait. I don't have much time to use at work so I can't really afford to take time off for doctors appointments. There is also the unknown expenses will may have with Ian this summer and without knowing all of that I don't want to add to it by having a surgery myself. So for the time being I am taking Advil when it is really bothering me and there will be NO aerobics.