Getting Hip The Hard Way

Having just navigated through the replacement of a hip and the first stage of recovery, I am now able to reflect on the last couple of years…the decline of function, the increase of pain, and my continuing impression of Treasure Island's Long John Silver, with his peg-legged gait, before I was wheeled into Surgery and put in the hands of a doctor whose work gives every indication of allowing me to live in a world with a much wider orbit than previously.

There is nothing on earth which can appropriately measure my gratitude for his and his colleagues’ skills in helping me get another shot at being able to walk comfortably. I even dream of a trip to Scotland and a hike around my favorite loch.

But here is what I don’t get and probably never will: Why did I get the best advice in dealing with my declining hip from a complete stranger in London, my stockbroker, and an old friend?

The people in the white coats were helpful, interested, and happy to prescribe physical therapy, the now rejected anti-inflammatories like VIOXX and Celebrex (and for a time these meds did help some), and home exercise.

Last year when the pain got to the point where I would do anything just to get through a day and a night without being driven bonkers by the pain, I felt I was hitting the wall. Then on a trip to London, my medical luck began to change. On a guided walk one Sunday morning, I was struggling to keep up with the group, when one of us came over to me and asked for my cane, and I was so surprised, I just handed it over, feeling like such a dumb cluck. The cane was adjustable, and she lengthened it some, and gave it back, saying, “Try this.” Recovering somewhat, I said something like, “Well, but..how…why.” I can be very good with words sometimes.

She responded, “Oh, well maybe it’s my thirty years as a physical therapist, maybe it’s because I got a new hip at Johns Hopkins seven months ago, or maybe I just recognized your walk.” For the rest of the morning, when the guide wasn’t talking, I was asking questions about hip replacement and getting good answers. She recommended some meditation tapes, and after I overcame my intuitive dislike of the prospect of some middle aged woman with new-agey flute music playing behind her telling me I should feel better about myself, I bought a couple and found the damn things actually helped.

Fast forward to last September and a phone conversation I was having with my broker. She asked about the hip, received a frank answer, and asked if I had ever tried water therapy. I described an attempt to do some of that in a YMCA pool, without much success.

She told me about a center with a therapy pool and recommended I get an evaluation. At that point, the pain told me I had little to lose, so off I went for my assessment, first on dry land and then in the 91 degree (F) therapy pool. The therapist said they could help me, and when I got back to the car, I did not know whether to laugh at the irony of finding this place so late in my struggle or cry.

So I signed up and began the long process of preparing for my surgery. Three to four mornings a week I was in the pool being trained by a therapist, and once my program was developed, I showed up and did it on my own. And this was the best thing I did. Period. Full stop. By the time the doors to the Operating Room swung open, I was ready, not just for the operation, but for the recovery from the surgery.

The old friend asked about my hip and recommended I see a masseuse she had discovered. I demurred, probably the usual guy thing. A few weeks later, the friend prodded, and I knew better than to resist. And so the masseuse helped get me and my hip ready to receive the titanium, polyethylene, and ceramic replacement.

I went straight home from the hospital to my home where my two sisters came over consecutive weeks and gave me the greatest gift I’ve ever received – their attention, support, and love. It was the first time we’d been alone together in half a century without spouses, children, pets, and so on, and my recuperative incapacities notwithstanding, it was a wonderful time.

I’m still using the meditation recordings; I’m back in the pool being trained to help me learn a normal gait; and I’m still getting massage. I have every hope that what I have learned and implemented in my daily life will help as I travel on.

In this day and age, we all have to be active, indeed aggressive, advocates for coping with our disabilities, whatever they may be. Books, web-sites, networking, asking questions of everyone who is or has dealt with a situation like yours can be incredibly useful in improving your coping skills, providing the resources for better questions when you do deal with the medical establishment, and improving your life and perhaps delaying surgery for a bit.

Yes, I have been very lucky, stimulated by pain and assisted by friends and strangers, accompanied by perseverance, something I learned from a paraplegic scotty who owned me years ago, but that's another story for another time.