Uncle B and a Shiny New Knee...Someday

Uncle Brad and a super distracted niece, Zoey - CK Health Alliance, Ambulatory Care, Ortho Clinic


A visit to the orthopedic surgeon's today found us in the care of Uncle B...and Zed was impressed.  I caught her staring and smiling a few times...following Uncle B around the room with her eyes, and grinning like a freak.  I think she was a little proud...probably in the most ignorant of senses, not having the first clue what was really going on, but I suspect she thought Uncle B was a Doctor.  Ortho Tech...Doctor...whatever.

After our most recent pain-mitzvah, and the subsequent swell-festival, it was back to into the lion's mouth for yet another consult.  This time replacing my month long follow up with an actual surgery, and adding a diagnosis.  Dr. K suspects that there is also lateral ligament tear, but can't be sure until he gets in there, so we'll skip the MRI and go right to the good stuff...a scope.  Who needs all that digital imaging foreplay anyway?  Not me.  I like a doctor that gets right to business.  So now it's more ice...more NSAIDs...and more compression and elevation, and this time we'll add to the mix some immobilization in the form of a stiff black brace the length of my damn leg that allows me to move it approximately four millimetres in any direction.  Sigh...shrug...smile.  It is what it is, which can occasionally be funny if June's around to lighten the mood.



So...home...immobilized, and doing a little pre-op reading...resting...and cursing every urge to pee, which means going either up or downstairs, and praying peeing is all I have to do.  Sitting is a little complicated.  All things considered, Zo's limping, lethargic excuse for a Dad is feeling pretty good.  The surgeon feels fairly strongly that there is no arthritis in the knee, which is astounding considering the amount of orthopedic trauma it's experienced (and does wonders to convince me that I do indeed live this life of mine with a horseshoe firmly planted between my cheeks), but he can't be 100% positive until he goes rooting around in there.  The X-rays are overwhelmingly positive.

"It's a great lookin' knee," he said.

Thanks Dr. K...and thanks Uncle B...with any luck I'll have a brand new shiny knee by the middle of May.  Without said luck...well, I guess I'll get great parking at Michigan Stadium what with a handicapped parking sticker.  In the meantime...I've got the best medical attention a guy could want. She might be little but my God she's cute.



Has anyone else out there ever experienced being taken care of my their toddler?  It's a big deal to Zo.  She brings me ice, kisses my knee, attempts to help me wrap it, and is seriously smitten with the velcro straps on my immobilizing brace..all SIX of them.  She places Advil directly in my mouth, and hands me a glass of water (it has to be done this way), and she spends an awful lot of time balancing between looking at me with sad concern, and tripping/falling/leaning/whacking my leg.

I'm not complaining.  Good pity is hard to find.