I have told you until it’s coming out of your ears what an
avid little athlete I was as a kid. Baseball was my favorite sport, and that at
which I was best was throwing. I had a reasonably strong, accurate arm, but the
wrong genes to revel in it. Throwing too much, I condemned myself to a
frightful case of arthritis by my mid-40s. It got to the point at which I could
barely walk. One swings his arms slightly while walking, and the slightest
movement of my right arm made me yelp in pain. I consulted Dr. Curtis Kiest,
the world’s nicest guy, and an eminent northern California orthopedic surgeon.
He gave me a series of injections. None helped. He said the only remaining
option was to replace the shoulder. I have had a titanium joint in there since
July 1995.
My understanding — deeply flawed, it turned out — was that
it would last me the rest of my days. But then, three years ago, intent on
retaining the slim, subtly muscular physique that has long driven the gals
wild, I had the bright idea of buying myself a weight bench. I did bench
presses and — presto! — felt as though someone had stuck a knife in my
shoulder.
Living, as I was, in the United Kingdom, I consulted the
National Health Service. “Sorry,” the NHS said, albeit in a cute Brit accent, “we
don’t do shoulders.” I returned to my semi-native Los Angeles and saw a guy at
UCLA Health. He recommended physical therapy. It didn’t help in the slightest.
The therapist thought I had a torn rotator cuff. This gave me very little
comfort. I made an appointment with UCLA Health’s Shoulder Guy. He kept me
waiting for nearly an hour, and swept into the examination room with a small
entourage, but charmingly. He said I needed a new joint.
I foolishly switched to Kaiser Permanente, whose Shoulder
Guy I hoped would say there was nothing wrong with the existing joint. He
instead said I would require two operations. “Nope,” said the UCLA Health one.
“I can do it in one.” The problem being that I wouldn’t be able to switch my
insurance back for eight more months. Sometimes I went days without pain, and
other days just raising my hand to my computer keyboard was enough to make me
whimper and yelp. Trying to avoid pain, I began holding myself in such a way as
to give myself lots of muscular pain. My UCLA GP was alarmed by the curvature
of my spine, and I by her alarm.
As you read this, I hope I’m waking up in the recovery room
with a new shoulder, a catheter precluding my bladder bursting, and a gigantic
sense of relief. The last time, they had me on a morphine drip afterward, and
it was one of the most enjoyable experiences of my life. Dr. Kiest came in to
see how my recovery was progressing and asked, “How you doing?” I, floating in
a thick, warm cloud, replied, “I’ve never felt better,” without a trace of
irony. I intend to implore the anesthesiologist to give me enough Versed to make
me forget the past month or two. Why take chances? I have also asked Dr. Petrigliano to keep for me the joint that he replaces, as I hope to make of it an objet d'art, or perhaps a necklace. Orthopedic bling!
If I’m able to lift my hand to the keyboard, I’ll relate the
whole story in numbing detail upon my return to Tower 46. You might want to pencil
this in on your calendar.
Fascinating. When I became 58 years old, I started to develop pain in or on my right shoulder. I'm married to a Japanese woman, and she and her (Japanese) friends told me that this always happens when you get older, and it will go away by itself. I had this pain for almost a year, and then suddenly one night, the pain left me. Once in awhile it feels stiff, but stretching it seems to help - Yours is a different issue, but I was intrigued by the Japanese side of the world with respect to the pain in the right shoulder.
ReplyDeleteI envy you, Tosh. That said, my favorite nurse was Japanese.
ReplyDeleteNothing like a Japanese nurse. I lived in Japan and had shoulder problems, so I can report that my orthopedic doctor diagnosed it as 50 year old's shoulder.
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