Yo Mom…you missed my heel!

I coached 7th and 8th grade volleyball again this year after a brief hiatus (I got the desperation speech and the puppydog eyes).  The one thing I am insistent on when my girls play is that they warm up and stretch completely before setting foot on the court.  I participate in practice quite often- so although I have not been to the gym since school started, I’ve been getting my exercise.

Speaking of which, last spring I made it my goal to run a sprint triathlon within a year.  Swimming and biking were not a problem, but I had never been a runner.  When I started running last spring I would get these horrible pains in my left heel every morning.  I was diagnoses with planter fasciitis, and started physical therapy.  Although the pain got much better, it never completely went away, so at the end of summer my physical therapist order custom orthotics.  Because of my busy schedule (I rarely, if ever was home before 6 o’clock at night I was not able to pick them up.  In a cruel twist of fate, my orthotics came in the mail on the Monday before my accident.  I was looking forward to getting back to the gym and giving running a try again - Thursday was our last game which meant that I would be able to hit the gym at least two- three times a week.

On Wednesday as I was leaving school when one of my friends called asking if I could fill in on her four women volleyball team.   Because Thursday was our last game, I had cancelled practice leaving the night open for the possibility.  I was excited as I hadn’t been on the court for real play in a couple of years.  I got to the bar shortly before the game was to begin…no…I did NOT stretch (not enough time of course).  About halfway though the second game (we lost the first and were losing the second) I lunged for the ball and felt a pain in the back of my ankle as though someone had kicked me.  As I looked up I noticed that all of my teammates were rushing over towards me, but no one was close enough to kick me.  I tried to suck it up, but it was clear my night was done.  I took a deep breath (I just kept hearing Tom Hanks in my head screaming “There’s no crying in Bar League Volleyball)…and hobbled over to the chairs.  One of my teammates got me some ice and I sat and watch the rest of the match.  At the end of the night I hobbled home and convinced myself it would be better in the morning.

The next morning I went to work, but I let my family convince me to go to the walk in clinic during my prep.  I went even though I had convinced myself that they would tell me to RICE it and try to stay off of it for a couple of days.  Boy was I wrong.  After waiting 2 hours to see a doctor (the place was PACKED with flu victims), it took him all of 2 minutes to tell me I had almost completely ruptured my Achilles.  They tried making an appointment for me to see the Orthopedic that night, but I had a game to coach.  They put me in a boot, gave me crutches, and told me to make an appointment for the next day.  I went back after school the next day and the news was confirmed - an almost complete rupture that would need surgery.  Luckily I was able to convince my surgeon to wait until Monday the 26th (I had too many things on the docket for the upcoming week, and we only had 3 days of school this week so I wasn’t missing a lot of time with my students).  So that’s how I got here…on my couch…with my foot up…getting ready for my first venture out of the house.  Oh yeah…and the orthotics are still on the table by the door - where they have been since they came.  I would venture to guess that my dreams of running a sprint triathlon are probably not only postponed, but possibly just a pipe dream now.

Deanne

Ok…I confess…I’d rather be in pain than not be able to feel a part of my body.  I’m just over two days out from surgery, and I can finally feel my entire foot.  The pain isn’t as bad as I expected, but I’m having a hard time finding a comfortable position to lay in.  I had planned on getting a bunch of papers graded while on the couch, but my mind has been so scattered that I only got 2 done so far.  I’m not really nauseous, but my stomach feels not quite right, and I’m not in pain, but my foot seems not quite right…ugh. There are times as I lay here thinking about the long road ahead and wonder how my dear husband will get through the next 6 months without getting frustrated with me.  We laugh because my 2-year-old’s favorite saying is “My do it myself” and she is insistent on doing just about everything that way - I think I now know where she gets her stubborn independence from.  I thought maybe starting a countdown would be helpful, but I’m not sure what to put as an end date.  I think the worst part about this all is the fact that there isn’t a set timeline.  My stitches come out on November 4th (the same day I have tickets to see ‘Rent’ again), but beyond that it seems to be a ‘wait and see’ sort of thing.  My surgeon said I can start light weight bearing somewhere between 2-4 weeks depending on how my healing is coming along.  Why is it that when professional athletes get hurt the entire public knows the timeline for each step of the return, but I don’t even know when I will get to step one.  Has anyone else experienced this sense of vicissitude in the lenght of their return to the real world?  Well tomorrow is my first venture out of the house- I’m going shopping for a wedding gift in the morning, and choir practice at night- so I’m hoping that getting out of the house will help me feel better about the independance factor.

Deanne

Well I’m home from surgery.  Went in at 8:45 this morning, had surgery as scheduled at 10:30, and woke up around 12:30.  By 2 I was on my way home.  I let the anesthesiologist talk me into a nerve block, and I’m sure glad he did.  I generally am against anything that causes loss of feeling, but since that part of my leg is really of no use to me right now- I acquiesced.  I realized that getting to the bathroom in my house is pretty easy…but getting up from the toilet is not nearly as easy.  Right now I am knitting a toe cover so my little piggies don’t freeze off- the stretched out sock just isn’t the right fashion statement.

My biggest fear now is how my stomach will handle the Percocet.  It’s probably odd that I am more concerned about the pain meds than the pain itself, but giving birth to three kids has a tendency to cure you of the whole ‘fear of pain’ thing.  Well, Jeopardy calls.

Deanne

I asked my surgeon if we could wait until the 26th to do the surgery because of a number of things I had going on in my life.  I really wasn’t in any pain, and from all of the reading I had done it seemed like I would be a lot less mobile after the surgery.  One choir concert, 3 days of lesson plans, district one-act competition, and singing for a wedding all done.  Today I checked off the last item on the list, and now it’s a waiting game until surgery.  Ok…so I still have to run my lesson plans up to school (more like gimp them up there), but they are done and that’s all that really matters. I think it was easier to wait when I had other things to worry about.

I’m not really nervous about the surgery, but I am nervous about not being able to do the things I need to for the next few days.  Right now my biggest concern is the cold that seems to be creeping up on me.  I’m not sure if it is a cold or allergies since it is just a stuffy nose, but I don’t want to delay surgery any longer.  Does anyone have experience with this sort of thing?  Should I be calling my doctor early Monday morning, or will they be able to operate if I have a head cold?

Deanne

I’ll go back and tell the story of how it all began later, but for right now I think it best to explain why a good friend of mine has resorted to calling me a mule.

I am not very good at playing the part of the damsel in distress.  I am a type A ‘overdoer’ with an inability to say “No” to just about anyone.  That said, I am one week out from my injury, and waiting surgery on the 26th (I talked my doctor into waiting until then because it meant less time out of the classroom, and I had a chance to do some of the things I said ‘yes’ to).

Did I mention I’m not very good at the ‘damsel in distress’ thing.  Last night I stopped at the store to pick up a few groceries.  I didn’t realize until I was there the potential problem pushing a cart while on crutches.  I made do by pushing the cart ahead of me and then hobbling behind it.  A few minutes into my excursion one of the workers at the grocery store asked if I wanted to use the “disability cart”.  My mind went in to full battle mode and immediately the response “I’m fine, thank you” came out of my mouth.  Regret instantly set in, but I had set my position and I was forced to hold my ground.  Twenty-five minutes later (I picked up 7 items from the store) I was hobbling out of the store with my bags of groceries thinking about how long the next few weeks are going to be.

Deanne