On Saturday morning, I woke up feeling like my leg was at a funny angle. No problem. I'll move and roll over, and everything will be okay. Wrong. As I moved, a familiar, if not unwelcome, pain shot down the outside of my left thigh and ended up throbbing near my knee. Fuck!
For several months, I have been coping quite well with my arthritic hip. Most days were bearable, and some were fantastic, with little to no discomfort. Then I had to go and meet the surgeon who is to perform my total hip replacement operation. No problem, I had to have some more X-rays to help the doctor get some internal measurements for the prosthetic joint he will be "installing". Fine. Until it wasn't. The radiologist needed me to lie on my back, bend my left knee and allow my leg to drop to one side. My leg moved about 10 degrees from the vertical. "Can you just try to move your knee down a bit more?" she said. I dutifully tried, and there was some movement. "Hold it there", she said. I held the position for around 30 seconds, but it was enough to change things for me.
At that point, I wasn't in too much pain, but I did feel like something was different, an uncomfortable feeling, as if something about my joint had changed, maybe even moved. That evening, I said to my wife that my hip was aching more than usual, so I took an extra painkiller and went off to bed. It was a restless night. And, to be fair, almost every night since has been disturbed.
Fast forward to last weekend. I went to sleep on Friday night, and I think I had a reasonably good sleep. But then, in the early hours, I must have got myself into what I thought was a comfortable position. It wasn't. All day on Saturday and overnight into Sunday, my leg has been getting increasingly uncomfortable, and yesterday, at my surgery pre-assessment, it began to be very painful again. Typical. So, I am not at work. I am waiting to see my doctor this afternoon. I need to find out if there is anything that I can do to mitigate the pain. I am only weeks away from my surgery. I wonder what can be done to help. Resting and allowing myself to get into a comfortable position is helping. As long as I don't have to move too far or too quickly, the pain subsides quickly. But the way the pain has flared up again is frustrating. I am so close to getting this fixed once and for all. I hope I can make it to the finish line in one piece.