Kickas.org Forums Ankylosing Spondylitis General Discussion #1 AS Web Support Group I'll have matching scars before long

Ok, so I went to my Dr today so he could read my MRI's from the other week on my left knee. You would think I would have learned about wearing a skirt after the last visit with the PA...but did I? Of course not! He never messes with my knee/joints at a MRI read, he just reads the MRI, except this time. I just looked at him and asked him if the PA told him to do it. He just chuckled. And promised not to look!
So anyways, he's messing with the right knee, wants to make sure it's tracking good. So he does that for a few minutes, then moves onto the left one. Asks me 19 million questions about it. Then sits me up and plops the MRI's on the screen. Looks at them, and then looks at me and shakes his head. He tells me he's not even going to give me the speech. I know what the speech is and he's not going to bore me with it. What do I want to do? Wait and see if it gets better/worse, go to PT or try to fix it now. I shake my head let out a huge sigh and say try to fix the stupid thing. He says ok.
So then, while he was messing with my knees he had an interesting look on his face, but I just assumed he was thinking about what he was feeling in my knees...WRONG. He asks me how my hips are doing. I just looked at him, not wanting to really answer. I shrugged my shoulders and he repeated the question. He knew I wanted to avoid answering. So I finally told him they hurt like he!! but I can deal with them for now. He looks at me and says you feel like you're in pain. Huh? What's that mean? Your hips are just really messed up. I can feel it when I was testing your knee. I look at him and say are you bleeping kidding me? He shakes his head no and says I'm so sorry Sarah, they just feel really bad. I'm like I know they're bad, but come on, give me a freaking break already!!!!!!! He looks at me and says I didn't mean to upset you, I just wanted to get a feel for how they and you were doing. They suck dude! They just freaking suck! I hate this bleeping disease! And I went off on a 5 minute tangent about hating this disease, my body, etc. And he just sat there and let me. When I was finally done, and apologized left and right (especially since I dropped some wonderful words in this rant), he looked at me and said we'll get through this. Not me, but we. He tells me that he will see me all day everyday if he has to to get me fixed, or an attempted fix. He doesn't want me living like this. I almost fell out of my chair. I knew he was the most awesomest Dr. ever, but just the way he handled that situation with me, was freaking amazing.
I told him I was still mad at him for telling me my hips were jacked up, but thanked him for everything. He helped me off the table, gave me a hug and said I'll see you in surgery. We'll get this left knee fixed and move onto the next thing. Whatever that may be.
And I walked away one happy camper. Go figure.
So, here I wait for the phone call scheduling this surgery and off we go with the left.
And if you're still reading this....sorry for the long post!
Sarah

Hi Sarah,

Sounds like a good doctor. Hopefully this all passes quickly and your AS behaves itself.

Tim

hi sarah..
sounds like u have a great doc!
i know my former podiatrist told me my left knee was damaged from my bad hip. i have one leg about 1/4" shorter than the other. what was odd was that the left knee didnt hurt as much as the right. turns out it was the lefty working harder and compensating for the right. thus more damage to it in the end. i had no idea that could happen b/c at the time my hips were ok. not so at this time.

good docs are hard to find. i dont know what i'd do without our family doc. he is a gem of a doc. keep us posted! hugs from buggy

I don't know how many more surgeries I can handle. This stupid disease better quiet down soon or I'll....well who knows what I'll do, but you know what I mean!

How's that munchkin doing? I want to see some updated pics!

He is a great doc. He's been in practice for 20 years and I've been going to him for 20 years. He knows me inside and out. And he knows my personality and how to get what he's looking for. I'm one of those people that don't show pain so well and he knows how to push my buttons to get the right answers from me. He makes me mad, but he's awesome.

Sarah, he sounds like a real gem. I'm so glad you have him on your side!!!

Sorry to hear about the hips in addition to the knees, tho.

Warm hugs,

And the real kick in the pants, before this left knee came up, I was going to go in for my shoulders next. Guess we'll do them last....I'm sure I'll need crutches for everything else.
Arg, talk about freaking frustrating!

Wow Sara, what a great surgeon. Sounds like he goes the second mile for his patients. I had a similar experience with my last OS visit, broke down, which I never do, and he just looked at me like I had 2 heads.
Sorry you have to go through all this. I REALLY know what you are going through. If you need to talk about those knees, you can PM me anytime.
Cindy

He does. And people who don't know him very well get quite irritated because he's always running behind on his appts because he takes so much time to make sure you're on the same page. He told me he expected me to blow my top and I think that's what he was going for. I think he could read my frustration, etc so he helped me get it out. I felt bad after I blew my top, but he was ok with it. And I walked away happy...go figure.
You'll probably end up getting a PM. It's just so frustrating. I finally really get back into the swing of things just to have this happen. UG....

Anyways, thanks Cindy!

Oh dear god, Sarah, I do hope they keep the two surgeries completely separate. I have this horrible image of your trying to crip along on crutches with mucked up shoulders and hopping on one foot and crutches flying everywhere! (which would be funny ... if it were in a movie ... with Matthew Broderick or someone equally talented). I'm keeping my fingers crossed for you.

Hugs,