"Rare"... was all he said!

So anyone who knows anything about me knows one simple fact... I have horrible knees! I started having knee pains when I was very very young. I remember telling my mom how much they hurt and I was like six years old. Of course there was this incident... I was six and we were out on the ski slopes. About all I remember is that I was flying down the slope and it ended up in a horrible crash at the bottom. I hurt both knees pretty bad and had to be carried around everywhere!! Needless to say I hated skiing every since but that is another story for a different time that includes dad tying a rope from me to him next time we tried skiing.

So yeah I've always had knee problems. Well then my brother started having knee issues and my mom finally took him to an orthopedic surgeon Doctor Pepper Murray. Little did we know then that Pepper would play a big factor in our lives. Well ended up Shaun has some plicka in his knee that needed to be removed and not soon after that I ended up seeing the good doctor myself and soon enough I was being scheduled for the first of many surgeries.

Well of course he found plicka in my knee as well. Plicka is a band of tissue we are all born with. In most people it sloughs off and goes away as you grow. In some people it doesn't and the band grows tighter and tighter around the joint and it causes pain and restricts movement. Well he found and removed plicka in my knee as well as arthritis. Yeah arthritis already! I was only probably 20 at the time. Well over the next ten years I've had seven knee surgeries. I had plicka grown back twice, I had a knee cap that wasn't tracking and was off 40 degrees.. A few surgeries ago he informed my that the cartilage in my knee was deteriorating and by the time I was 40 I was looking at a knee replacement in both knees. That was devastating to hear and I remembe crying in the recovery room.

So yesterday I went in for surgery number seven and when I woke up in recovery the first thing I asked my mom was the same question I always asked her first.... what did he find. I died when she told me. Of course he scaped away the arthritis, cleaned up the cartilage but he found that for a THIRD TIME the plicka had grown BACK!!!!! I said three times? I asked her what Dr. Murray had said about it and all Dr. Murray said (mind you he is a man of few words) is "rare!" That about sums up my family and the crazy things that happen to us... rare!

Well not long after as they are putting oxygen on me because I'm not breathing well.. Dr. Murray's PA came in to talk to me. He told me about the plicka growing back a third time and told me... He said about 5 people a year come in with plicka that has grown back a second time.... I was the FIRST PERSON he has ever seen where the plicka has grown back a third time!!! Yeah I shouldn't have been surprised!!!! I'm pretty sure it isn't normal to have seven knee surgeries and be told in your twenties that you are looking at a knee replacement in a few years!

Anyway so now I am upstairs doing the same drill. Ice on my knee.. knee elevated... and trying not to focus on the pain! Thank heavens for Shauns lap top!! Well after one c-section, and two knee surgeries.. I'm ready to head back to England in less than a month and join my husband!!!