Wait, what kind of surgery are you having again?

Last October (2013) I was out for a four mile run when I felt a sharp, stabbing pain in my right hip.  I pushed through, and finished my run.  Over the next few months I couldn't run without the pain, and the farther I got the worse it felt.  At one point I described part of my pain as 'feeling like bone was rubbing on bone.'  Still, I opted out of going to the doctor and pushed through the pain and continued to run and train for my half marathon.  In February of 2014 I completed my first ever half marathon, and was in the worst pain of my life.

That was the very last time I've been able to run.  Through out the half marathon training process I worked with a chiropractor to keep me as mobile as possible, but the day after the HM I made an appointment to see my doctor.  At first I was diagnosed with bursitis, an inflammation of the bursa sacs around my hip, and told to do these special stretches and that I should be better within a week.  Beezy pleazy, I had just spent almost 5 months in daily pain, there is no set of magic stretches that are going to fix everything in a week.  I continued to work with my chiropractor who pushed really hard for me to have an MRI, and so in March of 2014 I went for it.

The MRI showed that I had a torn tendon, tendonitis, a possible labral tear and an impingement cyst in my hip joint, and recommended that I have another MRI, this one with contrast.  I remember the night my MRI results came in my doctor called me to give them to me and was going to send me to physical therapy when all of the sudden she was like "Well, do you like running?" Um, yes, obviously, because I had just run 13.1 miles.  And so with those results she decided to send me to an orthopedic doctor, after ordering the MRI with contrast.  The MRI with contrast showed a labral tear, and 3 other cysts forming in my hip joint.

Fast forward through a set on x-rays, a 3D CT scan and an appointment with the orthopedic surgeon, and onto where we now know that I have several tears in my labrum, cysts forming in some of the tears, both a cam and a pincer type FAI, and something fancy called a protrusio.  All of this to say, my hip is jacked up and we are past the point of physical therapy and into the scary land of surgery.  Even though my surgery is already scheduled for August 27 we aren't sure exactly what kind of surgery I'm going to have.

There are two types of surgery to treat this, open FAI surgery and arthroscopic FAI surgery.  The best case scenario will be arthroscopic, but because of the protrusio I may have to have the open surgery.  Focusing on the best case, if I have to have the arthroscopic surgery they will make 4-6 small incisions around the top of my thigh to insert a camera and all of the surgical equipment through, shave down the bone on the top of my femur (ball part of the socket) and the bone on the actual socket to keep it from rubbing together and creating more labral tearing, repair the labrum and anything else that needs fixed.  Overall it should take 4 hours (normal people only take 2, but because of the protrusio there is significantly more bone to shave), and recovery will be 4-6 weeks on crutches, and 6 months until I'm back to normal.

Worst case scenario, they make the tiny incisions, insert the camera and realize 'Woah, this is way too much bone.' Then they pull out, close me up, and reset another surgery date to complete the open FAI repair.  To do that they will have to cut a piece of my femur off, rotate the hip and will have a 100% open view and access to the entire thing.  They will then shave the bones, repair the labrum and anything else that needs fixing, screw the bone back together and close me up.  Recovery this way is a bit steeper, with 6-8 weeks being on crutches, and the same 6 month overall recovery.

So, needless to say I am super scared.  Four weeks on crutches, not being able to bend more than 90 degrees, and raising three small children just doesn't seem possible.  But, I've opted to do the surgery, instead of waiting to see if it will heal on its own, because here we are, just shy of 11 months later, and I'm still in pain.  And not just a little bit of pain, but 'modify everything in my life' kind of pain.  I can't lay on my right side, clearly there is no running, no lunging, no squatting, no deadlifting, no a lot of things.  I can't practice soccer with  my kid because it hurts too bad.  I'm tired of everything hurting, and I can't wait to be able to lay in bed at night, on my right side and watch a TV show.  Or go for a jog.  Oh, how heavenly that sounds.  There are some things that I will probably never be able to do again (like squats), but I can't do those things now, so it seems like a small price to pay.

So, now I'm spending my energy focusing on going into the surgery at my goal weight (132 lbs), able to do a strict pull up, and a hand stand push up, and what I'll need to get or do to make the recovery process easier.  I've read a lot of blogs, and am trying to take this one thing at a time.  Hopefully I'm able to stay positive and accomplish everything that I need to before August 27!