Tears of Joy

Last Friday I had my 6 week post op appointment. My hope was that the new X-ray would should healing of the fracture and that maybe I could start putting a little bit of weight bearing on the crutches. I was nervous to hear that the fracture, again, wasn't healing.

Healing was on my side! The surgeon and his intern came in with huge, meaningful smiles on their faces. They said my fracture was healing really well. I asked him if he was just saying that. Partly out of being a smart ass and partly because over the last year I have rarely received good news about my hip recovery after a difficult surgery.

They placed my new X-rays on the light screen to show me the good news.

The circled area was an X-ray taken 10 days after surgery. You can see a dark shadow of a line that travels all the way past the middle screw.  That is my fracture. The second photo was at 6 weeks post op, with an arrow pointing to damn near the only part of the fracture left to heal. It's filling in nicely!

He then informed me that I could ditch the crutches while around the house, unless my hip felt tired or sore, but to use them when I am out and about. I repeated what he said to make sure I was hearing that correctly, that I could walk, crutch free around home after only 6 weeks? My first surgery left me on crutches for over 4 months, and a painful limp ever since. 

He told me he was signing me up for physical therapy to help strengthen my right leg muscles. I haven't used them in 6 weeks and they were violated twice during surgeries. He said I should be goden by Christmas. My husband and I exchanged giddy hand shakes with each doctor and they left the room.

I immediately started sobbing tears of joy. I've heard about crying tears of joy, but besides being a little teary eyed when my son won his super bowl, or when I saw my step daughter on stage for her first tap recital, I had no experience of real life tears of joy.

I was sobbing uncontrollably. My hands covered my mouth as I stated at Louie sobbing. It wasn't about being able to walk after 6 weeks of crutches. It was about healing and better to walk so soon. It was about experiencing progress after experiencing over 14 months of pain and disappointment. 

Louie took my crutches from me and asked if I'd like to try taking a few steps to him. I cried harder and blubbered the words "I'm scared!". He held out his hand to me and with my very weak leg, I waked a few steps into the safest place I know, Louie's arms. He held me there with a comforting grip while I cried some more. 

I couldn't stop crying, and I didn't want to! These tears of joy were intoxicating. All the emotions I had went through or held onto the past year were flooding out of my soul with one, long, 10-minute sob-fest of happiness. 

I looked for the doctor to give him a hug but he was on to the next patient. I'll be seeing him again in two months, hopefully with more good news and more tears of joy, although I'm not sure I can top that last one.

I went from having a painful fracture, to having a painful surgery with a painful recovery. The hardware fixated to my bone was large, painful and invasive to my life.

This was the first hardware I had put in. The fracture is circled and never united.

This piece kept me from sitting long, walking long, standing long, including not sit certain ways at all. It was painful to drive as it dug into my muscle with every left turn and ached horribly while sitting still and having my foot on the gas pedal. 

My new surgeon removed the hardware, fixated new screws, 3 of them in an inverted triangle, and filled up the gaps from the old hardware with a special bone cement.

A much smaller incision, less brushing, no infection, smooth and steady recovery.

There are screw holes left in my demure that are expected to close in about 2 more months. 

This bad boy below is out, and for now I carry it around in my purse until I decide what to do with it. It symbolizes so much for me and I'm happy to hold it my hand instead of my hip.