I want to thank everyone who asked me about my hip since my last post. I have to admit that it comes with a little guilt, though, especially with the latest twist in my hip saga but we’ll get to that.

I suppose it’s pointless to feel bad for oversharing about all the minutiae of my health and physical well being. At my age (which is approximately, “how’s your hip” years old) I’ve realized that this just kind of who I am. It’s how I deal. I have to tell everyone when something is wrong.

I guess there are people who keep their ailments and worries a secret so as not to bother anyone. I don’t understand those people. I talk about this stuff because when I keep it locked up, it starts to fester. So, I let it out.

But if I’m honest with myself, I suppose that I’m also disseminating my anxiety and asking you the reader, you my friend, to help carry some of it. It’s not exactly fair.

This hit me last month at my storytelling show at Halyards. I was talking about my hip stuff and I said, “You know because last year I had this thing called foot drop.” And everyone in the room either nodded or said “mmhmm” out loud.

Damn.

Anyway, I went to another hip doctor.

My friend Emily who’s a runner recommended another doctor who’s a runner, which is significant. As another friend told me, “Don’t trust a doctor who doesn’t know when the New York City marathon is.” That’s good advice.

I went to the new doctor’s office on the Upper East Side, feeling nervous about what he would say, what new symptoms he would discover, what possible consequences there would be if I kept running.

The first thing he did was take x-rays of my hips – both joints not just the left one, like the other doctor.

He brought the x-rays up and said, “Yeah, these are normal hips.” He didn’t mention pincer or cam lesions or any hip impingement. He pointed to an area at the top of my femur and said, “Could this be a little smoother? Sure, but it’s no big deal.”

This doctor told me a couple of things. First, if you gave an MRI to anyone out on the street, roughly half of them would have a labral tear. He told me that if I were symptomatic, I would have severe pain and be unable to run after even a few miles. Also, my pain is on the outside of my hip, which is not where labral tear pain is, generally.

I sent him my MRI and he emailed me back to say that it didn’t look like anything serious and to not let anyone operate on my hip. He prescribed more physical therapy, which I have yet to get. But I will.

So, what about the first doctor?

I won’t quote this second doctor but he essentially said that the other doctor is a surgeon and surgeons want to do surgery.

It was then that I remembered the previous doctor said that my MRI revealed that I have a 5% rotation of my hip joint. He said he could perform a surgery in which he breaks the femoral head and inserts titanium rods into the top to correct it. He also talked about a surgery where he would take my blood, centrifuge it to get my platelets, and then inject them into the hip joint to help heal the torn labrum. I looked that up and the effectiveness of that surgery is debatable at best.

That guy just loved surgery.

I should probably see a third doctor now so I’m not just hearing what I want to hear. But I’ve felt fine since the second doctor told me that I was. And therein lies my guilt. I’ve been bothering you, dear reader, with something that may or may not have been in my head.

I’ve run three races this year, the Prospect Park 10k, the Seneca 7 relay race around Seneca Lake (I was responsible for 11 of the 77 miles), and the Brooklyn Half Marathon. So far so good.

I’ve heard from several people who have had bad experiences with all kinds of surgeons. I’ve learned that second opinions are a good thing. My friend who’s a surgeon wrote a post after hearing about my hip called, “Expert Opinions Aren’t Fact.” That’s good to remember.

In writing about my anxiety and paying attention to how my mind works with meditation, I’ve realized that I have to step back and see the big picture. There’s always going to be something. I have to face problems without always screaming that the sky is falling.

I might see another doctor in a month and be told that I have to have both legs amputated. I doubt it but you never know.

I had one more appointment with the first doctor at the end of May. A day before, his office called me to confirm. I told them I would be canceling. The receptionist asked why. I told her because I found another doctor that I like better. That was a childish way to put it, I suppose, but this dude wanted to cut me open just for kicks. I think we’re square.