Tuesday, August 10, 2010

Surgery Tomorrow

Well, tomorrow at 9:00 am is the big day.  After getting an MRI it turns out that my knee is worse than originally thought - 3 of the 4 ligaments are torn.  The orthopedist that the hospital had referred me to said that the surgery would be more complicated than he anticipated and referred me to a sports medicine specialist.  Now it looks like I'm getting 3 new (actually used - from a cadaver) ligaments for my birthday this year.  A few weeks ago that would not have been high on my wish list, but how quickly things can change. 

As of now I have pretty ambivalent feelings about the surgery.  On the one hand, I'll never be able to walk again without it, but on the other it is pretty major surgery with a lot of risks involved not to mention that I'll be in pain for weeks if not months afterward.  The closer it gets, the more nervous I'm getting.  So, any Christians I appreciate your prayers, everybody else I appreciate any well wishes.  I'm going to be in surgery for 5 hours.  They tell me it will be 4-6 weeks of crutches after that and 9-12 months before I can start jogging and 2-3 years before I'm fully recovered. It's going to be a long, unpleasant recovery.

I have the same injury that Daunte Culpepper suffered in 2005.  Since that more or less ended his career, it looks like I'll never be able to throw an accurate pass again.  I guess I'll have to start looking for sports which involve more standing still in the future.

5 comments:

Lyndsay said...

Scott I will definitely be praying for you and the skilled hands of the doctors.

Brandon said...

:( Definitely sending you good vibes.

Jesse Taylor said...

I went through this surgery 20 years ago, so it was performed with a hacksaw and a bottle of whiskey to keep me unconscious...your procedure won't be nearly as barbaric...

Did you tear the medial meniscus as well?

The Chuckman said...

*Well wishes.*

We'll clearly have to concentrate on your foosball and MarioKart sporting careers. :(

Unknown said...

I did tear the meniscus too, however the doctor gave me the impression that it was pretty trivial in comparison with the rest of the damage to the knee. He said he was going to stitch it up and that it should heal up and not cause any problems.

And while surgery has gotten a lot better over the years, it's still pretty barbaric. I hope to live long enough to see those Star Trek devices that they can just wave over an injury a few times and heal it up. But yeah, my cousin had his ACL replaced about 20 years ago and was in the hospital for 5 days and then on crutches for 3 months. I got 3 ligaments replaced and they sent me home that day. They are telling me 6 week of crutches which I wish wasn't so long.