My knee problems!

So I have been meaning to blog about this for a long time as it happened ages ago, and has been a big part of my life as of recently. I have KNEE PROBLEMS!

History: As a child I would have my knee cap (patella) dislocate quite frequently. It would always pop back in but it was always something that would bring me to the ground, put me in a panic and then I would be ok. Honestly, 2 seconds later I was up and walking again and it wouldn't happen again for months.

I remember my mom taking me in once and the GP telling her that I could be referred to someone who could do a knee surgery on my muscle to help it so it wouldn't dislocate anymore. We didn't go that route. Instead we discontinued the sporting activities I was involved in to give it a break.

That seemed to work- I went almost 10 years without any problems- Which is a good sign because most knee problems happen with kids as they grow and when you are an adult the percentage of people that continue to have knee problems rapidly decreases.

So, now I am 30 and I have had my knee dislocate in February and then again in June (which for me is pretty much back to back). The June incident was bad. For the first time in my life my patella did not pop back in! In fact it stayed dislocated for about an hour. I was home alone when this happened and I originally went from pain, to shock, panic and then breathing exercises like I was in labor (as my knee would go into these really hard contractions every 10 minutes--the whole area around the patella would just go into a knot).

It looked like this, my knee was to the side...I am kicking myself (no pun intended) for not taking a picture since I had my phone on me!

Anyway, I called Stan (who was at work- it was 9pm), who then called May (a friend down the street) who came to help me. She tried to take me to the hospital but I really couldn't move. I had already tried to stand up to hop and that was the most amazing acute pain I have ever experienced as my leg was kind of just hanging there.

The only option was to call an ambulance...which I thought was so stupid; but then agreed too once I had lost all feeling from my knee down. I was afraid something was pinched, which then made me afraid I would get a blood clot (which for me is very bad as I am protein S deficient. Protein S is something everyone has- when your blood clots up, protein S diffuses the clot...I don't have enough of these guys).

So we called an ambulance- I am absolutely positive we were at the bottom of the waiting list- most people call an ambulance for emergencies. I was Ok- just in pain and unable to move. My hypothesis was confirmed after we waited for an hour and no one came.

While I was alone I had been looking up Utube videos on how to relocate my patella...there are some good ones:

Video 1: the long painful way--seriously, why did I wait an hour sitting here like this high school kid?

Video 2: The moral of the story- athletes know best!

The moral of the story is to just smack the knee cap back into place so you can get on with walking and get out of the pain- the longer the knee cap is dislocated the longer you'll be in pain!

Anyway, I got my knee back in place without the ambulance (which we cancelled), and now I see this physical therapist about every 2 weeks. First we fixed the knee, now we are examining why I walk like a duck and how this is possibly contributing to my knee problems :-) I am starting to feel better and at the same time a little hopeless at the prospect of having to learn how to re-walk after 30 years of walking. On the upside who can say no to some guy massaging your knee for an hour with no other option but to listen to you talk non-stop?