The leadup to D-Day
Thursday 29 September 2005. A day I'd been waiting for with lots of nervousness everytime I thought about it ... time for an ACL reconstruction. This is the story of what led up to that day ..
Flash back to May where I'd been playing indoor soccer with some friends in a friendly comp, and had run up to tackle a guy, and found myself hit the ground hard all of a sudden. I mainly remember feeling my knee "pop" and hearing Dani telling me to breathe - I had actually stopped! It hurt a little and I went off, felt ok in the second half and played again (schoolboy error) before my knee gave way while running on flat ground. It was a bit sore but I still managed to drive home.
Next day I went to my GP and he said it was probably a sprain so I got an x-ray to make sure nothing was broken. So for a few weeks I took things slow but slowly got back to playing sport / going to the gym etc. At the time, I was training for Trailwalker 2005 and so was starting to go on 6 hour long bushwalks on the weekend. I noticed that my knee started to give way every now and then, everytime I stepped on it a certain way - it only happened once or twice a week but was enough to make me think I should start getting some physio.
My physio felt my knee and taught me some quad exercises, but by the second time I saw him, he said it felt funny and that I should see an orthopaedic specialist. This time I started to get worried, and my worst fears were confirmed when I saw the specialist who told me I had completely torn my ACL (anterior cruciate ligament). I'd thought that might be the case after getting home from the soccer game and using google to see what a "pop" meant, but had hoped that I was just being a hypochondriac.
Getting an ACL reconstruction is not an easy decision. Your ACL is basically the ligament that stops your leg from going too much to the side - very necessary in "sidestep" sports like soccer and basketball. There are lots of people who opt to never get it done and simply adjust to life "walking in a straight line". The risk of not fixing it are you might get premature arthritis and that you will do further damage to your knee, but then there are also risks that the surgery won't work and there could be serious complications. You do have time on your side - you can think about things as an ACL is not an urgent surgery (I didn't get mine done until 4 months after the injury).
Thank god for that - just after I found out, I was about to head off for a five week trip to South America and New York which I'd been looking forward to for ages! On the trip I managed to climb Macchu Picchu (albeit very carefully, slowly and gingerly :) with the torn ACL. Came back and decided for quality of life, I needed to get the surgery.
What with meeting surgeons, getting a second opinion (as you want to make sure of these things) it wasn't until mid-September that I finally had a date, and a surgeon. Luckily one of the best ones in Sydney.
And so D-Day arrived.
Flash back to May where I'd been playing indoor soccer with some friends in a friendly comp, and had run up to tackle a guy, and found myself hit the ground hard all of a sudden. I mainly remember feeling my knee "pop" and hearing Dani telling me to breathe - I had actually stopped! It hurt a little and I went off, felt ok in the second half and played again (schoolboy error) before my knee gave way while running on flat ground. It was a bit sore but I still managed to drive home.
Next day I went to my GP and he said it was probably a sprain so I got an x-ray to make sure nothing was broken. So for a few weeks I took things slow but slowly got back to playing sport / going to the gym etc. At the time, I was training for Trailwalker 2005 and so was starting to go on 6 hour long bushwalks on the weekend. I noticed that my knee started to give way every now and then, everytime I stepped on it a certain way - it only happened once or twice a week but was enough to make me think I should start getting some physio.
My physio felt my knee and taught me some quad exercises, but by the second time I saw him, he said it felt funny and that I should see an orthopaedic specialist. This time I started to get worried, and my worst fears were confirmed when I saw the specialist who told me I had completely torn my ACL (anterior cruciate ligament). I'd thought that might be the case after getting home from the soccer game and using google to see what a "pop" meant, but had hoped that I was just being a hypochondriac.
Getting an ACL reconstruction is not an easy decision. Your ACL is basically the ligament that stops your leg from going too much to the side - very necessary in "sidestep" sports like soccer and basketball. There are lots of people who opt to never get it done and simply adjust to life "walking in a straight line". The risk of not fixing it are you might get premature arthritis and that you will do further damage to your knee, but then there are also risks that the surgery won't work and there could be serious complications. You do have time on your side - you can think about things as an ACL is not an urgent surgery (I didn't get mine done until 4 months after the injury).
Thank god for that - just after I found out, I was about to head off for a five week trip to South America and New York which I'd been looking forward to for ages! On the trip I managed to climb Macchu Picchu (albeit very carefully, slowly and gingerly :) with the torn ACL. Came back and decided for quality of life, I needed to get the surgery.
What with meeting surgeons, getting a second opinion (as you want to make sure of these things) it wasn't until mid-September that I finally had a date, and a surgeon. Luckily one of the best ones in Sydney.
And so D-Day arrived.
posted by Claire at 12:51 AM
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