If you a little squemish I suggest you don't read on, I need to get this out though, so this is what is happening with my knee. In case you missed it,
here is the original story.
Ok, so the problem is that I can just be walking (rather limping) along and all of a sudden my knee will just pop out to the side. The doctors call it an unstable knee. I call it a pain in the neck. Basically the original reconstruction didn't take, this was due to many reasons one of which was that I was pregnant and carrying the extra weight was not very helpful. Anyway I was sent to a specialist at the start of April and he said that my knee was so bad that he couldn't help me, but refered me to the head honcho at the Royal North Shore in Sydney. The original specialist was awesome and personally contacted this surgeon and made sure he would see me in a hurry. So I had an appointment set up for the end of May. A minor miracle to be seen so quickly in the public health system. Anyway I got a phone call last Tuesday from the new surgeons receptionist who asked if I was available to see him on Thursday!!! Apparently the first Dr sent an email to get the appointment moved up.... wow did I feel special hehe.
Anyway that feeling didn't last long as two different doctors examined and photographed and video taped every movement of the examination. I had two lots of x-rays and lots of pushing and pulling and tears, then the bad bits. They told me what they were going to do.
Apparently all the ligaments, tendons, muscles etc from the side of my knee right round the back to the other side are torn and useless. They aren't doing their job and holding my knee together, so my knee actually goes backwards, so when a normal knee straightens your leg is straight, my knee goes back to a 20 to 30 degree angle. It also goes about the same to the right.
A normal knee recon is not going to do anything because my fractures have healed and there is nothing wrong with the joints, its all the tissues. So they say because all my bits are useless, they are going to have to use doner tendons, ligaments etc.... Now I have always been a very loud advocate for organ donation! When I go, anyone is welcome to any bits of my body that may help them. I always said imagine if my kids need a kidney! Anyway the thing is I never imagined that
I would need anything. I don't know how I feel about it.... even as I write this I feel really uneasy. I still haven't come to grips with it, because it's not a life threatening problem, it's just a walking problem.
As I read that back it seems incredibly selfish, a quadraplegic would do anything to have my knee I'm sure, but I still feel really uneasy about it.
Anyway they also have to remove my Fibular bone and somehow (my eyes had glazed over by this stage and I didn't really take it all in) drill a hole in my bones and fit the fibular back in somewhere straightening something or other..... no idea really. The end result being after a 5 hour operation I will be fitted with a brace that will be screwed into my bones. This is what terrifys me. My kids will be petrified by the sight of it and I don't know how it will feel when they take it off, and how will I get my knickers on hehehe.....
I'll be in the brace for from 6 weeks to 3 months, basically as long as possible. This means I'm back in the wheelchair for around 3 to 6 months, depending on how it all goes. Surgery is set for July.
All because of a bloody spilt bit of cordial.... beware of wet tiles people!!!!!
Anyway don't feel sorry for me, their are people worse off than me!! I just needed to get this out there, anyone with any experience in this I'd love to hear from you....
Thanks for listening...
Paula x
