Jumping on the bone factory bandwagon.
I sneezed at the orthopedist’s office the other day. “Yup,” he declared, “Hip replacement is in order!”
Okay, so I exaggerate. It happens at times when I am flabbergasted and drained of color when I hear shocking things with my own ears.
My orthopedic visit began when I had some discomfort recently in my hip for a spell and hoped that I could get some information and treatment. I am accustomed to crackles and crunches when I stand up in the morning, but not feeling like the Tin Man in The Wizard of Oz. A chiropractor friend advised me to see about it, but thought offhand that it would be nothing more than bursitis, a term that I had barely heard of. He then recommended that dreadful ice pack in the meantime.
Ugh. Ice. I have been on enough ice in my lifetime to be a certified cadaver. My past experience in the ballet reminds me that it single-handed dispenses injuries to every joint in the body. Between two knee surgeries, sciatica and a sprained ankle, I’ve seen my serving of on the rocks rather than straight up. Not to mention tendonitis and whatever else there is around Achilles and his murderous Greek friends.
I looked up “bursitis” on a friendly reference and found that there were pockets of gismos around the body that swell. The proper term seems to be “flare-up,” as in a fire engine emergency call. The condition coincides with days that you gimp about the house hoping for the Wizard to save you. It also may follow some traumatic assault on the body, like too many trips to the kitchen to pour more wine.
There are worse afflictions in life and I wouldn’t take this opportunity for sympathy, especially as on social network postings where a “friend” blows her nose and fifteen people respond with “praying for you.” Too much information.
So I went off to an orthopedist taking pot luck of staff provided. After all, this particular medical professional had “Dr.” before his name so the assumption is that he can dispense some information. Also, that he didn’t graduate at the bottom of his class in Mongolia or held a certificate as a used car salesman.
Subsequently, I found myself waiting anxiously in a cubicle after a plethora of nurses, computer info takers and various door-greeters telling me to report to this or that location.
My first shock when this Dr. entered was his rather demeaning ballet pose that suggested he had never grown from the “Tiptoe Through The Tulips” mentality. The pose suggested that ballet dancers have pumpkins on their heads and stand around like cardboard set pieces. I wouldn’t have had time to venture a response because I had already been ushered onto his agenda.
“Does it hurt when you walk? Yes or no?”
“Does it bother you when you walk too much? Yes or no?”
By the fourth and final “yes or no” question, I was waiting for the buzzer on Wheel of Fortune. Three seconds maximum was all he would tolerate before his hip replacement diagnosis. He had no time for words like “ice” and “bursitis.” He showed actual irritation as if the enemy camp was in the room. My X-ray lit up behind him, but he had no interest in explaining my hip condition. As a regular slob who cannot interpret images, I would have appreciated some brief tour of why exactly I needed replacement parts. I dared to think that it looked like a regular, garden-variety hip.
Out of time, he was onto his next patient on the conveyor belt. “I want to see you in a month,” he ordered. Fat chance and a cold day in hell, I thought.
