elisem

OK, went to the doc, and found out two useful things. First, what's wrong with my knee is that I apparently reinjured it -- it had been mostly doing well since a kickboxing injury in 2005, but the thing I did to keep from falling last Wednesday means I have a course of physical therapy in my future. Again. But hey, I know it can work, because it did before, right?

The other useful thing is not a happy thing, but it's useful to know. Remember how they were scanning me to see if my body was making unauthorized bone art, which is what I prefer to call heterotopic ossification? Yep, it is. And the bone it's sprouting is growing into (or possibly out of, given what heterotopic ossification is) some major muscles, and no wonder it hurts.

Heterotopic ossification is "bones growing where there shouldn't oughtta be bones growing." They just up and sprout in soft tissue. "Outside the skeleton," says one source. That's why I referred to it as unauthorized bone art. The x-ray I was shown made it look sort of like a sculpture of a piece of broccoli, or perhaps coral. (Those are not pearls that were my eyes, thank you very much. We'll have none of that here.) Anyhow, the bone is sprouting out of where my hip replacement was done, and it's growing through two of my muscles. No wonder it hurts, as I said. (Side of the glutes; I'll have to get the specific description again, but no, I am not growing a tail, you guys. It's on the side. If anything, it would be a sort of tailfin; there's no matching one on the other side, though, which is fine with me.)

This has to be the goofiest thing my body has gotten up to in a while.

At this point, there's no treatment except surgical removal, with no guarantee it won't just start up again. Well, OK, they could surgically remove it and then try doing radiation -- I think not -- or massive doses of anti-inflammatories -- which I can't take due to the Crohn's disease -- to dissuade it, or try one other thing that doesn't sound all that great to me, but none of these are guaranteed and there are risks, and also my GP agrees with me that more surgery is not the most appealing idea in the world just now.

So. At least I know why it hurts. I said to my doc, "It's just more pain. I know how to deal with pain. I don't like it, but eh. If it takes away function, then we can look at options again, but for now I just plan to live with it." And she's not thrilled that it hurts either, but she agrees with me that it's the way to go for now. I really like that my GP is easy to talk to about quality of life issues and medical choices like this. She never bullshits me, and she never talks down to me.

Anyhow, that's the haps. And at least they're both on the same side, so one cane does for both, as it were.