Wood is down.
The poor fuck, Heywood, found out he's got a torn meniscus. After having 3 knee surgeries myself, I can commiserate...it sucks. (In my experience, a tear in the meniscus=certain surgery or no more athletics.) I'm sure many of you out there can offer your thoughts to Heywood on this. Knees ain't built to last, it seems. So here's my list of thoughts. You add yours in comments:
1. Get well soon. Don't despair...you'll come back. I've done many tris and marathons since my last surgery. You will too.
2. Find the best knee guy you can. Don't just go with an orthopedic surgeon...find one who specializes in knees. I was young and dumb with my first knee injury. The local guy "did me." I wound up needing that redone 3 years later. The other knee came later: a friend got me in to see the guy who scopes the NY Jets, for that knee. He was awesome. Really knew his stuff. And he was much more aggresive / intelligent with rehab than the other two times.
3. Start PT ASAP after surgery. Because you're an athlete, you're apt to think you can do your own rehab/PT. Resist this urge. Get going on PT ASAP.
Here are some funny things I found...
Running on road doesn't really hurt my knees. Any sort of cutting motions and trail running kill me. 10 miles on the road...no problem. So I still run, but I don't play Bball, football, racqetball, or trail run, really, anymore. Funny thing is you'd think trail running would be easier than road because of the soft turf. Not in my experience. My last surgery was 10 years ago...I seem to be doing ok so I just accept that some things are not "for me" anymore.
Some other things I do that help me...
Warm up well all the time. Easy spin, easy run, easy swim FIRST. No matter what I'm doing, I get blood going and build. I never go right at it.
Here's one that helped me a lot with running: shoe rotation. Shoes need gas recharge time. If you run in the same shoes each day, the cushioning is seriously compromised. I buy 3 pair at a time and rotate. They last just as long if not longer and provide better cushioning the whole time.
Smart weight training (well after you're fully rehabbed!) to maintain musculature around the knees. I never do heavy leg weight training nor radical motions anymore. (In college we did heavy squats, leaps, 1000 lb leg sleds etc...DUMB.) Now I do no-weight SLOW & BURN squats with a fixed range of motion--I never let my quad go below parallel to the floor and I take a 10 second pause/hold/fucking burn at the sit portion of the squat then come up SLOW. I also do low weight extensions in a similar manner--slow and burn and hold. Again, I wouldn't even think about this shit until well after you're fully rehabbed.
My father-in-law swears by shark cartilage and glucosamine/condroitin (or whatever the fuck it is) for his knee injury. I think this is bullshit and will wind up fucking up your liver/kidneys in the long run. Others can weigh in on this one.
Hang in there, brother.
15 comments:
Heywood - Don't let Al's gloom and doom get you down. I've had both meniscus scoped. One for a major tears, and the other for what was described in professional terms as "a mess." It's not a big deal usually, if fixed correctly, as noted by Al. Think of it as a torn fingernail, except inside your knee, and it won't grow back. The part that's flipping around is digging in and causing pain, but it ain't really hurting anything. They go in and clean it up. The removed 30% of the meniscus in my left knee, and it's been fine since. The only activities I backed off on are cyclocross (high speed dismounts on frozen ground with crappy mtb shoes is just dumb, and that's how I f'd it up in the first place) and heavy squats.
The rehab is key. The first one my leg atrophied horribly. The second one I was shoveling snow the next day and doing aggressive rehab. Be careful though. A lot of PT techs are just kids right out of school and they are idiots. I pulled a hamstring in my good leg the last time I did rehab, and that held me back more that season than the knee did. Don't do shearing exercises, but everything else should be fine. Make sure you get copies of the scope photos so you can post them on the blog. Good luck bro.
Moveitfred understands that Wood endured a mishap while attempting a scissor-kick dismount on the pommel.
Apparently there's still hope that it's not too serious--potentially just a strain radiating from trauma to his mons pubis.
Effin' bad luck either way Wood!
What the fuck? I thought that upbeat vid montage was just the thing. Sor-ree!
Fred, you douche, your link is ka-put. Don't you know how to embed a link properly? Put your helmet on, step down off the small yellow bus, and get to work.
efffffff Moveitfred.
effffffffff Blogger.
effffffffffffffffffff Al.
Yo, wood, how 'bout an update. And I want my motherfucking Kangol back.
Wood is consumed putting on the nasty "plant and launch" out at the pole vault venue. Seems this is easy on the knee, so to speak.
The knee is feeling good as long as I ride. If I run and or climb stairs, it starts to swell. Not to much pain except when it locks up for a sec. Right now it is just a speculation that there is a meniscus tear, something call a bucket handle tear but this needs to be confirmed by a MRI. Only problem is that this happened on duty at work so I have to go though workers compinsation. This takes a bit of time. In the meantime, I will just keep riding. Thanks for all the advice Al and Solo. Did anyone watch Paris-Nice?
Moveitfred was too busy watching pole vaulting on YouTube.
Oh yes, Wood. I saw Paris.... NICE!
Hello. This post is likeable, and your blog is very interesting, congratulations :-). I will add in my blogroll =). If possible gives a last there on my blog, it is about the Smartphone, I hope you enjoy. The address is http://smartphone-brasil.blogspot.com. A hug.
Al-
This one of your intelligent Brazilian friends stopping by? Y'know, the ones who have had "the fix?"
Al,
Next time you go buying three pairs of running shoes at a time, think of all of the runners in Africa with no shoes at all.
Spread the love bro.
If those skinny fucks would slow down so I could chat with 'em, I surely would spread the love. But the MFs are too quick for me.
Meniscus? Piece of cake. I'm a three time loser myself and I can still actually stand up and walk from the couch to the fridge AND BACK!
Seriously, do the rehab as they recommend and you'll be as strong as the American dollar against the Euro!
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