The Waiting Game

I know I haven't been posting much, but to be honest there hasn't been much to post.  I've just been waiting, trying to not irritate the hip, trying not to flex my hip or do anything with external rotation.  Still, I do feel pain in my hip; but it doesn't feel like the same type of pain.  But it's unsettling, trying to just wait.  Different scenarios keep popping into my head:

1. Prolotherapy heals the labrum and my psoas doesn't have to be tight and I'm no longer in pain, get to do anything and everything. Dream come true, really.  But honestly I'm just not ready to accept this as a real possibility.  It's just so foreign and so.... too good to be true.  I am afraid of getting my hopes up on this one.
2. Prolotherapy with sodium morrhuate isn't enough, but using PRP injections work and fix everything.  If this happens I'll be a little pissed we did two sessions of just sodium morrhaute, feel like we just wasted 2 months.
3. Prolotherapy doesn't work at all, and I have to get surgery, but after that I'm set.  I really doubt surgery is the answer, but if it's all I have left then I gotta try it.
4. Prolotherapy heals the labrum but I'm still in pain.  ...This would probably be the worst scenario because then we go back to the mystery of why my psoas is so tight.  Perhaps I did something else during the lifting competition.  This idea scares me the most, not knowing.  
5. Absolute worst case is I get surgery and it doesn't help with the pain.  That would be a disaster.

I really hope that I get scenario 1 or 2, with the end result of no more hip pain.  I've lived with it for so long though, it's really hard to imagine.

My pain still feels like it's in the psoas, but I also feel some pain when I squeeze my heels together.  This feel more like the pain associated with the pulled groin.  This makes me nervous in that maybe there is something new going on down there.  When I saw Bobby about a month ago he found a lot of knots right above the pubic bone, and the referall pain I experienced when he worked on them felt a lot like this new pain.  I saw Bobby last week and this time he didn't find anything like that (although the psoas was still tight).

This has just been a never-ending puzzle, but I'm not going to give up until I've figured out everything.  I am not going to let this beat me, I am going to beat it.

FAI/labrum tear does not have to equal surgery!

So I just got a question from a follower from Denmark asking how I'm coping post surgery.  Maybe there's a bit of a language barrier, but maybe not and I haven't been that clear.

So let me clarify the record.

Two years ago I was diagnosed with FAI (cam and pincer type) and was told I may have a small tear in my labrum as well.

Incidentally I learned I had tight hip capsules.

I started seeing a massage therapist while doing exercises to treat the hip on a regular basis to release the hip muscles, and it starts to render me pain free.

Fast forward to August last year and I seemed to make the hip worse in an Olympic lifting competition.

I go get another MRI to see what's going on.  In the report it comments that my femur heads are nice an smooth, nowhere does it mention that there is an impingement.  It seems that my impingement has gone away.

I still have a laberal tear though (which seems to be the root cause of the pain), so I start seeing a Dr Hauser, a prolotherpist, and I seem to be progressing nicely.

Nowhere in there did I get surgery.  For me, surgery is not the answer for a hip impingement.  An impingement is the result of poor mobility, if you fix the impingement it will just come back because you still have the mobility issues.  Moreover, even if the surgery fixes the underlying issues it may not leave you pain free.  I'm willing to bet good money that the large majority of people who have pain and impingement actually have muscular pain and not joint pain.  If you fix the impingement, the muscles are still going to be too tight.  After months or years of learning how to be tight (and painful), the muscle is going to take a lot of attention to make it release and stop hurting.  If you go online and read people's blogs who just have the surgery, it just doesn't seem to work.  Even if you have multiple surgeries (like five of them).  Surgery is at best an incomplete solution.

First fix the mobility issue, the body will take care of the extra bone growth on its own (mine did).  If you already have a tear in the labrum, then try prolotherpy before surgery.  Prolo seems to be largely dependent on the skill of the administrator.  For example, the "expert" in Alexandria said he couldn't help me, but lo and behold I'm getting help from Dr. Hauser and it seems to be working.

My point with all of this is surgery is not the only answer.  Orthopods think it's the only answer because that's all they know.  They don't know anything about massage therapy or PRP treatments or anything else.  They just do surgery, and that's it.  So if you ask an Orthopedic surgeon for help of course all they are going to recommend is surgery.  But there are other ways, I'm a prime example.

[Edit 7/8/13: I am now seeing a PT who does dry needling, and it is doing wonders for the last remaining bits of pain. I highly recommend you find someone who does dry needling early on in your search for pain relief.]

Post second treatment report



As LMFAO song goes,
"Shots shots shots shots shots shots"



Ok so I saw Dr. Hauser again and he felt that the labrum was coming along nicely, so we stayed with the sodium morrhuate solution.  I'll admit I wanted to try PRP, you know, the good stuff, but if this is working then I shouldn't complain, especially since the treatments costs go up from $300 to $600.

 My hip did not feel as nearly as affected this time as it did last time.  I did not have any problems walking up stairs with either leg whereas last time my hip was locked up so I only used my left leg for a couple of days.  I definitely seem to be more mobile than last time.

At first this had me concerned.  Is the treatment not as effective? Did I do something wrong?  I've been dydrated from food poisoning so did my body just soak up all that extra solution?  "Oh no this isn't going to work and I'll have to have surgery!"

Then I calmed down a bit and realized maybe it's because my hip has gotten better so it can handle it better.  I'm going to email the doc's office and find out what they have to say.

I was hoping for more answers, but it seems like I will just have to stay the course and be patient.

Ready for my check-up

Well, leaving for Dr. Hauser's office in a bit.  I'm not worried like last time now that I know what to expect.  Now I'm just hoping that he sees signs of improvement, and if not then I guess we'll step it up to PRP injections.  Either way, I'm excited.  I really hope this does heal my labrum, it would be fantastic.

"can't put your hip in a sling"

So with this prolotherapy I'm supposed to keep my hip from cracking or clicking.  Problem is, I use my hip all the time.  I've figured out a way to get out of bed that greatly reduces my chance of a click, but if I raise my knee to my chest just a little too much I get to hear a "click".  ...I've also figured out ways to put on my pants and shoes that do not involve flexion of the hip, but there are still times when I accidentally raise my foot just a little too much.  Hell, now I even go up the stairs by only stepping up with my left leg and then bringing my right to meet it.

Even with all these precautions, I'm afraid that I've done too much to really allow the hip to heal.  However, the clicks do feel less... substantial(?) then before the treatment. So I'll take that as good news.

I'm going to see Dr. Hauser this Friday for another treatment and  check-up.  I no longer have the nervousness since I know what to expect, am just excited to get closer to having a completely healed labrum.  Let's hope this all works.

2011: Year in review

So it's the first day of 2012, and I thought it would be appropriate to look back as the past year.  There were a lot of changes, but let's look at what happened.

In January, I competed for the superfit competition and got 66th out of 73.  Def not the best, but i really enjoyed the time spent with the other CFOTers, will always remember wandering around in the cold looking for a place to eat that was open (I was introduced to "Hungry Harold", who is a rather impatient person).  I was introduced to bourbon barrel beer (heaven in a glass!)

In February there was a crossfit-life changing experience, where I started to see that crossfit may not be the end all be all I thought it was. Where I started to realize that if I wanted to lift heavier with the squat, deadlift, and press then I needed to work on those with a program that used periodization, not muscle confusion.  You got to change it up to break through plateaus, but there are programs that can produce linear results (for a while) that will lead to stronger lifts then what I could do after 3 years of xfitting. This is also where I started to see the dangers in some exercises, like the kipping pull up.

April was also a big month.  I was on the paleo diet in earnest and was starting to reach my dream in terms of physique, and I moved from Alexandria to Barrington, leaving my crossfit home/family Crossfit Oldtown. That was a really tough move, I knew CFOT was irreplaceable and was going to miss everyone.

May was when I met Bobby for the first time, dude is amazing and led to me figuring out all kinds of things that have been going on with my body.  I now sleep on my back.  That's a huge deal and has really helped with my shoulder pain.

I also join the oly lifting program at Crossfit Rise, and am hooked.  I realize that I've been lifting with my back, not my legs, and this is a huge step to lifting heavy and safely.  I train for a competition and it is awesome and eye-opening.  Mostly I realize how I only need to lift heavy with like 5 reps, and not have to do many reps of such complicated lifts.

At the end of August I competed, and it was an awesome experience, the adrenaline rush was awesome.  I really felt like I accomplished something. Unfortunately, I also injured myself in the process, pulling my groin and doing something else in the process.

The remainder of the year I've been doing pilates, swimming and rehab on my pulled groin.  The groin gets better, but there is still a lot of pain.  I figure out it's my psoas again, and it's tight because it is trying to protect some soft tissue damage.  That, in turn, has led to prolotherapy.

This past year has been pretty amazing, but it's hard to imagine I've been injured for like four months now as I try to figure out what is going on in my hip.