from getting a Diagnosis to getting a Date

I've always prided myself on achieving extreme goals. By age 20, I had finished an Honors degree (with distinction) in English and an A.R.C.T. in Speech Arts and Drama. By age 23, I had sailed around the South Pacific in a wooden sailboat (without showers) for eight months, ran three full marathons and finished the fabled Ironman Canada race: 3.8 km swim, 180 km bike ride, and 44 km run in the blistering Okanogan heat. A couple years later I was working fulltime as a Registered Nurse, skiing a lot and trying out Olympic Weight Lifting as my next extreme hobby.

My body started rebelling against me March of 2013. My left hip had always been a little weak and would get a little a sore with lots of activity, but it started getting worse. 12 hours shifts at work would leave me in tears; running was agony; on a family trip to New York in April walking through museums caused tears and my hip began to ache at night.  I went to physio and saw a sports doctor and they couldn't figure out exactly what was wrong with me. An MRI showed that I had a cyst on my hip. Weird, but treatable: a radiologist just stuck a needle down into my joint and tried to drain it but the fluid in there was too "goopy."

The stupid hip deteriorated quickly.  I was referred to an Orthopedic Surgeon: getting groceries was the farthest distance I could walk. I relied heavily on my nursing student to get through the day at work. My physician wrote a letter of urgency to the Surgeon's Office. Finally, on November 19th, I had my appointment. The surgeon's student told me, through a thick accent and with many hand gestures, that what I had was "very, very bad." I would have a "big operation" and I "would not walk" for several months. I cried and flustered the poor man. He scurried off to find Dr. Johnston and my sister-in-law hugged me and helped me get all of the snot off of my face.

My curly haired surgeon came into the room and told me that I had CONGENITAL HIP DYSPLASIA, a fairly uncommon condition. He would have to cut me open from above the hip bone down to my groin, cut through all my muscles and break my hip bone in three places. Then, he would rotate the hip socket and put the head of my femur back to where it should be, pin my hip bone back in three places, and stitch me back up. Oh, I wouldn't be able to walk for about six months afterwards, and my GP could deal with  my current pain and stuff, but he was really good at his job. Oh, a year afterwards he would do the same thing to my right hip. And yeah, I probably wouldn't be able to do any of those things that I loved like running, skiing, etcetera for a long time.

I cried some more. And told my boyfriend and cried. And told my mom and dad and cried. And told my friends and cried. And told my bosses and cried. And journalled about it and cried. I think my worst moment came when I looked up books on my hip condition on Amazon and Amazon kindly suggested I buy a raised toilet seat. I cried.

I stopped crying halfway through December. Life went on. My boyfriend and I bought a house and he became my fiancé. But my pain continued to worsen: I had to go off of work on disability at the beginning of February; my Occupational Therapist got me a nifty forearm crutch/cane to help offload weight from my bad hip; and I had to go on stronger and stronger drugs to be able to sleep at night. The extreme luxury of buying my own groceries was a thing of the past as my ability to walk decreased further and further.

Now I have a surgery date: May 7. I am terrified, relieved, sad, anxious, scared, and every kind of emotion you could imagine. I started this blog to let everyone know about my recovery. Maybe it can help other people adjust to life with their own disabilities, pain, and obscure medical conditions that are usually found in purebred dogs. I have spent three solid months reading, knitting, quilting, embroidery, wedding planning, chatting on the phone and anything else that doesn't involve standing or walking. I will spend the next six months in a hospital, using a walker, and learning how to walk all over again. Just another extreme hobby for me to add to my list.