A non-Shae update (can you imagine?!)

I promise to get back to the Shae photos soon, but I have a non-Shae update in the meantime. (**gasp**)


Last month Tim and Chris Conlin (with Cate and Henry) came to Colorado to ski. Having not had a lot of opportunities in the last couple years to do much skiing, I decided to head up with Brian, Chris, Keeley and Taylor to do some schussing at Copper Mountain.


A lovely day it was, albeit a bit chilly. (I can gripe -- I live here! Locals don't ski when conditions are less than perfect.) Everyone had great fun and the snow was ideal.


Mid-afternoon, Brian, Keeley and I headed up to the tippy-top to take a dip into Spaulding Bowl. The plan was to ski down, meet up with Tim and Chris W. (who were dropping Taylor off at the bottom to join Chris C. and Henry) and then drop into the bowls again.


All was well and good... until half-way down Spaulding Bowl my skis decided to stick in one spot under the pillowy ankle-deep snow while my body went in an entirely different trajectory. It wasn't even a very good fall!


There was some immediate pain. There was -- I think (I can't be entirely sure) -- a !pop! in the middle area of my left leg. Then there was a few moments of total quiet while I tried to figure out what was going on, where the pain I knew was in my body was located, how to answer Brian's question "are you okay?" and what was going to happen next.


What did happen next was quite a lot of swearing (sorry Keeley!), me trying to relocate myself from my perch on the mountainside to a more level area down below, and an eventual call from Brian to ski patrol asking them to get me down the mountain after I realized that I wasn't going to be able to do that on my own -- a realization that came to me with a jolt when I put weight back on my leg and the knee joint "shimmied" laterally. Ouch.


Also ouch, but only to my pride: a ski patrol sled. In 30+ years of skiing, this was my first ride. The upside of that ego check was the very good-looking New Zealander named Jimbo who pulled that sled. Yes, Jimbo.


Anyhoo, there's actually not a lot more to report since that February day. Having knowledge from when Jody fell and hurt his knee in Crested Butte a few years ago that the mountain clinic won't do much more than take x-rays and then refer you back to your primary care physician in town -- and charge you mightily to do so -- Brian helped me walk (er, hobble) out of the clinic without seeing a doctor; I instead self-medicated the pain at the Dam Brewery with the Conlin and Wrabetz clans over dinner.


The next day I went to see Dr. Chris who, after a thorough examination, assured me that all my ligaments (ACL, MCL, those types of ligaments) were, indeed, still attached. So yay! I chalked it up to personal melodrama and a bad sprain; nothing wrong with lots of ibuprofen, ice packs and a subtle (okay, very noticeable) limp.


Fast forward four weeks: I still can't straighten my leg, nor can I completely bend it, it still hurts and I still limp. So last week I caved in and went to the CU Sports Medicine clinic in Boulder, had some x-rays and talked to the orthopedist. She ordered an MRI which I had last Friday; I'll have the results read on April 4 (the next opening at the clinic). Her suspicion is a torn meniscus. If that's what the MRI confirms, I'm told the solution is a very easy surgery with a very short (like as in hours, possibly) recovery time.


Oh, and I should add that at the end of my conversation with the nice doctor about my knee I mentioned that my ankle has been very pouffy and my shin/calf/ankle has been very tender since the fall. Her light bulb went off and she immediately sent me to the hospital down the street for an ultrasound on my leg. Well what do you know: I have a blood clot in my calf! So I'm currently taking a blood thinner (Coumadin) to evict Scott the Clot (yes, I named it) as soon as possible.


As mentioned this blog will return to its regularly scheduled programming of Shae photos, videos and antics soon -- I just thought I'd use this medium to update any readers (are there really any readers?) who I haven't talked to personally or who have only seen my cryptic Facebook posts alluding to issues with my knee.


Happy spring one and all!