another week another doctors appointment...lets hope this one fits

Hello readers,
As the title of this post tells you, i seem to pretty much see a doctor every week. These doctors range from my GP, surgeon, Neurologist, and now ill be off to see (another...) pain specialist.

However on Friday i had a miraculous outcome. I was at the neurologists, and after discussing my current pain situation and all, he examined e and said "I think you have something called meralgia paresthetica. It's an entrapment of the femoral cutaneous nerve which we can fix by either giving you a cortisone injection (into the groin) or you'd need to lose 15-20kg"

It's been a long time since I've had a doctor be so confident in their diagnoses, and although im not entirly confident that this is all that is causing my pain, I hope it may give me some relief.

Now I'm not afraid to admit I'm a big girl. I weigh roughly round 100kg and could stand to lose a few (ive already lost over 9kg!!), but even when i was super fit and had hardly any fat on me (<25% in 2002-2003) I still weighed 82kg. All chronic pain patients know, and are told repeatably (mostly when your feeling your worst) that weight loss will help improve your situation and help with the pain. However, to achieve this acquired goal, when your in such a situation is rather hard, as it is often hard enough just to shower and get out of bed for the day, let alone go out for a jog!

Anyway I'm clearly going to have the cortisone injection, and luckily enough i was able to be fit in to have it done on Friday the 4th. It will take a few weeks for the injection to work, and if the diagnosis was correct, i should slowly have a decrease in pain over a period of about 3 weeks. Right now id give anything to get rid of this pain in my groin. It's right where the adductor muscle or shall i say it's ligament, joins onto the pelvic bone. Its quite an awkward place, and lucky for me, that's where the injection will be going in. I've already been warned its quite a painful process. fingers crossed, the doc injects the cortisone into the right nerve and also its the right diagnosis!

In my last post I discussed depression and whether or not you know if your going through it? With the guidance of a new friend, someone I've never met, yet I feel like I've known her, or somehow I am her, assured me that at some point we all get depressed to some degree about what we are going through. Since my last post, and reading her comment, I've tried to get up each day for a purpose. Even if it was just going to the supermarket with a neighbour, just to get out of the house. I even hope to return to uni this week. With each of these ups and downs, its getting easier to distinguish the real ones, not just the ones in between.

signing out,
Jen xx

PS: Yes, I know there are many ways and combinations to lose weight other than just going out for a jog, however its not as catchy and as good as that sentance. :)

Welcome to blog spot....

After reading other peoples blogs, i decided that maybe this may be the best way for me to write about my thoughts and expiriences that happen in the coming months.
You see to understand what i will proberly blog about, you'd have to know a little bit about me:

- Im a 22 year old student.
- I spend half of my week in the country, and the other half back in melbourne.
- I started uni in 2006, yet in 2009 i am a first year physical and health education student.
- I am vain enough that i wont wear the same thing twice with the same group of people when i go out.
- I love my friends.
- I love taking photos when im out, and i like the fact that i seem to have a photogenic face.
- I love exercise but cant often do it.
- I dont like beer, cake, donuts or chocolate.
- I have a weekness for anything made by wonka confectionary.
- I am blonde and blue eyed.
- My life revolves around my hip.
- The last 3 years have been the hardest time of my life and it often feels like it will never end.
- My dad passed away from cancer on the same day as my first hip operation.

Now to explain what i will mostly be blogging about. My hip. You see, i had an accident while on a uni outdoor ed camp and i dislocated my right knee, and somehow shove my left femur (leg bone) into my pelvis. Now although i didn't break any bones, i managed to successfully ruin my life from then on... To create a very long story into a short one, this hip injury was very difficult to diagnose, and after almost a month in hospital being poked and prodded, the doctors decided that i had ripped the labrum (hip cartilage) in half. This then sent me to have a private surgeon perform an operation where he put two pins and 6 titanium tacks in my hip joint. To shorten this story even further, in under 2 years I've had 3 surgery's in total on my left hip, for a second tear and boney growth within the joint/build up of scar tissue and now I suffer chronic pain.

Thats me and hopefully it will give you a basis of why i am about to start blogging about whats happening now. I think it may help me get out the frustration of pain, and doctors etc.

thats my first post and not my last.
signing out,
Jen