So, Michelle and I just had this text message exchange… and I’m not sure how I feel. Bear with me while I work through how I’m feeling about it.
Let’s go back to the beginning of the year, when I started feeling my right knee pain and how it was really limiting what I could do and how I felt. I put off going to the doc; because I felt like I just needed to rest it a bit; then I’d be back at it. I took a couple of weeks off of pushing cardio hard to “let it rest”. I came back and started running again; after a couple of weeks of 3 days per week running, I just couldn’t do it anymore due to pain; and had to stop. It was at that point that I decided to get a referral to an Ortho doc. I went in to see Dr. Nicholson in April; and he and his resident recommended an ultra conservative treatment, which I signed up for despite the fact that I thought it wasn’t the right course of action. A steroid injection and PT. The injection worked like magic on my other knee; so I thought I would give it a try on the right side. The pain went away; no doubt about it for two whole weeks. I took the time to give it a chance to work. After those two weeks, I got on the elliptical; felt a familiar twinge in the right knee and haven’t touched exercise equipment since. I scheduled another appointment with Dr. Nicholson and he ordered an MRI. On June 21st, I got a call from Lindsay the PA in Dr. Nicholson’s office to let me know that “Lol, you have no ACL in your right knee anymore; and this is more than Dr. Nicholson can do; so he wanted to refer me to Dr. Cole.” (emphasis mine, Lindsay was great and professional.. she would never have “LOL’d” at me).
So, today, when I went in with Michelle to meet Dr. Cole; I was really unsure of what to expect. I had done my research into ACLR surgeries and recoveries and was ready for that discussion. His recommendation is to go conservative. He’s going to do a scope and clean things out and see if that alleviates the issue; rather than an ACLR with a big long recovery. If I’m not having stability issues (which I admit, I’m not having major stability issues); then having that surgery off the bat isn’t worth the risk.
The struggle that I’m having is that its been nearly 8 months already.. and going conservative seems OK; but if it doesn’t fix it; and after another 3 months of PT and treatment it’s still not better and we end up doing the big ACLR anyway; I’ll have lost another YEAR toward reaching my goals.
So, in that respect, I’m a bit disappointed/doubtful that it will work. So far, conservative treatments haven’t worked for me. On the other hand, I know just how much work the recovery is from an ACL Repair; so I’m glad that a simple solution maybe, just maybe this time will work.
Also, I get it that he can’t promise that this will get me back to running and moving normally; but come on man, I’m coming to you because you are the best knee surgeon on the planet, give me something! If it comes down to work that I can do; then he can take it to the bank that I’ll be back. Beside, he’ll be just another doubter that I can prove wrong.
Let’s talk worst case. Let’s say he gets in there and cleans it out and says “Aric, you’re good to go”. I do PT like a robot; and am a machine. I get back to it; and its still not right; or going out and/or causing pain. When I’m there, then I can look at having the ACLR. It wastes time. That’s the biggest annoyance. Doing a 1/2 Iron Triathlon before I’m 50 looks like a stretch goal now.. wait until I have another 8 months of rehab on top of it!