A Fight I Would Pay To See...

...would be between a podiatrist and an orthopedic who specializes in ankle and foot surgery. Man, those two do not like each other.

Case in point. I told my podiatrist that I was getting a second opinion from an ortho. He told me that was fine but "be careful" because they tend to do "short stints as fellows in ankle and foot care." This was unlike a podiatrist who spends all of his time working on feet and ankles. I go to the ortho. I tell him a podiatrist referred me. He huffs and says "well I'm the one with the MD." LOL

Why am I seeking a second opinion? My podiatrist is about to get smacked over the head with my damn cane, that's why. Why? The guy knows I'm in a time crunch. I have four weeks off between semesters and if I have surgery done on my foot it has to be in this time period. Reasonable, right? Well the guy has been hemming and hawing going for a "conservative" approach. I have no problem with conservative but it's been 11 fucking months. Yes, 11 months since I originally broke the foot. If it hasn't healed on its own, it ain't gonna do it now.

So, I see Dr. Asshole (as my husband is referring to my podiatrist as) last week. He wants me to see his colleague before we schedule the surgery. I do that. She wants me to see him again to schedule the surgery. I do that. I saw him this past Monday thinking "OK everything is set for the surgery." Ya right. I needed to talk to the surgical coordinator who wouldn't be in until yesterday. Called yesterday and she was like "well the earliest we can do is the week of the 15th and you'll need labwork, an EKG, chest x-ray, and pre-certification for surgery from your primary care physician." Huh? OK. I call my primary care physician and they were like "this is basically a physical so we can't schedule you until the week of the 15th for the work..."

At this point I literally started crying. You have to understand something. I broke my foot in January. They didn't see the break so it was treated like a sprain for two months. Over the summer it started hurting again but I couldn't do anything about it until October because of my crazy schedule. So I've been in serious pain for over six months. The past three have been so severe that I've been popping Vicodin the minute I get home from work. I've wanted to have surgery last week and they've known this for well over a month! Now they are telling me I have to wait until the week before the semester starts to have surgery? If I had known I had to do all this crap like scheduling and blood work and such, I would've made the appointments back around Thanksgiving when I decided to have surgery. Why the fuck didn't they tell me any of this?

To make a long story short, I'm thinking Dr. Asshole has been pulling my chain. For some reason, he doesn't want to do the surgery on my foot. Or at least through him leaving out vital information, everything is being delayed to the point that I might have to wait until May to have it. I don't know if he's bilking me for money by making me come in for all these office visits or if he simply doesn't feel comfortable doing the surgery. Either way I'm pissed.

So today I went to see an ortho. Nice guy, a little snooty, but I've learned most orthos have a certain air about them. He looked at my x-ray and my MRI and was able to explain exactly what was wrong with my foot in less that five minutes. Mind you, I couldn't get this out of Dr. Asshole. Most of what I learned I got off the internet, which is kind of scary. Dr. Ortho said the problem is that I've been walking on this foot for 11 months and it's "angry" (understatement to say the least). He says that for him, three months is usually the threshold he gives to his patients before he moves on to more aggressive treatment. So far I'm liking this guy.

Anyhoo, he said that I have two options. The first is to do nothing and hope that it heals on its own. Well, it hasn't been working that way so he suggested the second option: surgery. What he is going to do is try to reattach the piece that broke off. If he can't do that, he'll remove the bone piece and reattach the tendon to the "good" bone. Then he is going to fix my tendon that's torn. Oh ya, he did explain this a lot more clearly. The tendon didn't tear from the edge. Instead, it tore a hole in the middle of the tendon, almost like a donut hole. Dr. Asshole never told me that, but then again, he never looked at the MRI.

Can you tell which doctor I'm going with now? Tomorrow I'm going to schedule the surgery with him. I'll probably still be the week before the semester starts but I can't wait until the end of the semester. I got my temporary handicapped parking tag today and if I have to be on crutches I'll have to be on crutches.

The worst part about all of this? He can't guarantee I'll be 100% after it. He said he's shooting for 50-60% better. The problem is that I've been walking on it. If I got it fixed right after it happened, then things would look better. He did say the pain will go down once it's all over and I think that's the most important part to me. I can live with a few aches and pains, not what I've been enduring for six months.

Oh ya, another notch against Dr. Asshole: he looked at my original x-rays from January. Guess what? The idiot found the break. Why he didn't see it way back when is beyond me but I'm a little pissed.

I'll try to keep things more updated in my little personal soap opera if I can. Too much crap and not enough time in the day.

Bah humbug

I saw this on the Psychokitty blog and it's so fitting of my mood right now.



Have I mentioned how much I hate my students?

"But why did I get a C? I didn't miss five classes? What do you mean I lose points when I miss five classes?"

"But I sent you the paper. Seriously I did. What do you mean I can't e-mail it to you this weekend?"

Bah.

Almost there...

...one more final to give in about a half hour. I just have to grade that (thank God for scantron machines), finish up the grades for this one class, and hand everything in. Once that is done, my semester is over and I can go sleep for three days.

There was much rejoicing.

Under Pressure

It's the terror of knowing
What the world is about
Watching some good friends
Screaming 'Let me out'
Pray tomorrow - gets me higher
Pressure on people - people on streets

O.k.
Chippin' around - kick my brains around the floor
These are the days it never rains but it pours

Under pressure
Under pressure

- Queen "Under Pressure"

This is how my life feels right now. God is the semester over yet? Three more days. Just three more days and a foot high stack of papers to grade. Well, at least it's down from a two foot high stack.

Almost there

I wrote all my finals yesterday and today and I have 90% of my lecture notes prepped for this week. There is still have a three foot stack of papers to grade but at least half of my work is done.

All I keep reminding myself of is "two more weeks." That's all that's left in the semester.

I can make it.

I hope.

It's Officially Winter...

...when all the ski resorts in a 30 miles radius have opened their doors for the season.

The one nearest to me, Mountain Creek, has been running their snowmakers for two weeks now and it looks like a winter wonderland. All the others, Hidden Valley, Mt. Peter, and Tuxedo Ridge, have also been making snow like mad to open today.

All this makes me hate the fact that I can't learn how to snowboard this winter due to my foot. Honestly, I just want to jump around and play in the snow but I can't. Bah.

This does mean that the semester is almost over. Technically it ends on the 22nd, but that's a Saturday. My last day is supposed to be the 20th but I've moved up all my finals for between the 12th to the 18th in case I can get a surgery scheduled for the 19th or 20th. I can't wait. It's been a very, very long semester.

If I do have the surgery then, it'll mean Christmas on Crutches, which will be interesting especially since we're hosting it at our house. At least I won't have to cook.

This year we will actually be having a Christmas. The past few years we couldn't afford to exchange gifts but since this will be our first Christmas in our new house, we are exchanging. The Bear did get me my Christmas present already. Since I'm into scrapbooking, he got me a Klik-N-Kut die cutting machine. It has a hefty price tag but I can hook it up to my computer and use as many designs and fonts as I want without having to pay for cartridges. I'm getting him an Ebook since he has so many books in electronic format. I think the Fuzzies have ordered something else for him too but that's a secret. :)