I had my knee surgery yesterday and it went well.  Nothing unexpected.  It appeared as if the cartilage damage was from a fall I had during a run last year.  Did I mention that I fall sometimes?  Last year, maybe in October, our group was about a mile or so into an 8 or 9 mile run and I tripped and fell.  I broke the fall with my knee – THE knee.  It was terrible.  It was still kind of dark and we had really just started the run so I was feeling bad that someone would have to walk back home with me, so I limped a few steps and then just ran the rest of the 7 miles in pain.  I don’t mean kinda hurting a little bit pain, I mean REALLY, REALLY hurting like HELL pain.  In hindsight, maybe I should have just gone home.   When I did get home and could look down at my knee, I realized there was a big gash and blood was running down my shin.  I did notice that people we ran past kind of looked a little too long in my direction.  No one told me, though – which was good.  I would have panicked.  I was limping for days after the fall.  It never occurred to me that I’d caused any lasting damage, though.

Yesterday morning I started to have second thoughts and was wondering if I was making the right decision.  I thought I might be able to just get another shot in my knee and could make it through December.  Obviously, I went ahead with the procedure and I’m glad I did but recovery will be harder than I thought.  Sitting around not able to do anything is killing me already and it’s been less than 24 hours.  I can’t bear any weight on my knee now so I have crutches that are cumbersome to say the least.  I want to just hop where I need to go but have been instructed not to….  

Random info about the hospital visit:  My pre-op nurse was funny.  She called me sugar, babe, honey, sweetie, baby, honey bunch…  I don’t know where she was from, but she pulled out all of the southern terms of endearment!  She also told me how she hates to see black girls go pail.  Apparently, we are in BAD shape if we start losing color.  I am usually offended by being called ‘girl’ but for some reason I wasn’t at all bothered with her.  She was funny and she kept me from thinking too much about the surgery.  🙂  Good bedside manner is very underrated. 

So…  I’m here at home with this big old dressing and bandage on my knee.  This is gonna be interesting.  Will I be back running in 2 weeks, 3 weeks, a month?  I don’t know.  I can’t wait, though.  I just need to keep reminding myself that there aren’t any short cuts.  In this case, short cuts would be a bad thing.  I’m gonna struggle with this.

I can do it, though…