Just Wait, It Gets Worse!

Bad news, injured again. It started 5/20 after a short run and a pool workout. During the evening my left hip felt a little out of sorts - like it was misaligned or slightly dislocated. It had been a minor annoyance initially but developed into something that was impacting my ability to sleep at night. The following weekend, I went to Deep Creek Lake and put in some good miles of hills. During that time, there was still some issue but I thought it possible that it was a soft tissue problem that was maybe referring pain to my hip. On 5/31, things seems to have improved a bit and I went for another short run (2-2.25 miles). The following two days were full of immense pain and I considered going to an Urgent Care clinic to have things looked at. I got on the calendar for Dr. Bennett and Dr. Johnson although the earliest they could get me in were 6/12 and 6/22, respectively. During the interim, I loaded up on painkillers and arranged an appointment with Dr. Shrefler at Shrefler Chiropractic on 6/5. For the low, low fee of $198 he performed a 40-minute evaluation of me an determined that there wasn't anything he could do as my pain was not a result of a soft tissue problem. He suspected that I might have a labral tear and would need an MRI and then referred me to a couple hip specialists in the area. I appreciated his admission of an inability to help but things were getting very frustrating.

I was able to get on the schedule for Dr.Ochiai at Nirschl Orthopedic for Monday, 6/11. Then, a weird thing happened. I was out with some friends on Saturday night, 6/9 and got into a cab. Somewhere during the course of the cab ride, my hip pain disappeared. I tested it by running a few times on short bursts and miraculously, no pain. Slept fine and felt 100% through Sunday as well. I still attended my appointment on Monday just to confirm that I could return to training, et. al. After a 1 hour wait, Dr. Ochiai saw me and performed some tests on my flexibility and movement, whether or not I felt pain. nothing showed up. He was about to dismiss me but decided to order an X-Ray just to be sure. I am somewhat suspicious of orders I feel may be necessary but since this issue was so bizarre, I didn't object. I got the film taken and it automatically popped up on the computer screen in the examination room. Naturally, I looked at the issue was immediately clear, there was some irregularity near the ball joint of my left hip. Dr. Ochiai came in and identified the same thing. He wanted a better look focusing on the area in question so I returned to get another X-Ray. Results:

He diagnosed me with femoroacetabular Impingement (FAI) syndrome, with a broken acetabula which has, in all likelihood, torn my labrum. At least I know what it is now.

He suggested an attempt at resolving the issue with physical therapy in an effort to avoid surgery. I agreed to try the PT and after getting a PT script mailed to me, contacted recommended physical therapists via the DC Tri Club. I asked what their experience with FAI is in order to determine the practice I want to go to. The hips was feeling a bit better so on Thursday, I went to Hains Point for some laps with sprints. No harm afterwards so I decided to queue up a long bike ride for Saturday. I went pretty long for my current level of fitness and I barely noticed my hip while on the road. Then, the pain came. Sunday hurt pretty bad, sometimes constantly, other times when moving outside a specific range of motion.

I managed to play through the pain and bought a new city bike after selling my 1960's Sturmey Archer internally geared hub bike. I was vacillating between a Scwhinn off of Amazon, the Fuji Absolute from Big Wheel Bikes or some other option. I was looking for something that was not too expensive due to the possibility that it might be stolen so my original budget was $200-400. Naturally, I settled on a $479 Trek from Revolution Cycles and purchased a $55 set of fenders to go with it. Budget schmudget. I test rode the Fuji Absolute 2.0 at the Big wheel in Georgetown and it felt great. Unfortunately, they did not have a black Absolute 4.0 there but did at their store in Clarendon. Since we were in the area, we stopped in at Revolution in Georgetown and spoke with Santi, who was great. Unfortunately, we had a similar issue there in that the specific bike I wanted was not available in that store. Tried the Absolute 4.0, hated the grip shifters and felt stretched out so went to Revolution and tried the Trek 7.1. The sales guy sucked a bit, immediately trying to upsell me. When I finally pulled the trigger, they refused to provide a free install of my current rack on the brand new bike I just bought. I was almost shocked that they wouldn't comp a $15 service fee after buying a full-price (albeit entry-level) bike and a relatively expensive accessory. Fortunately, another co-worked overruled the decision and they will install the rack when the fenders come in. I love the new bike, unfortunately, I cannot ride it right now. The bike/fender purchase in addition to the new lock, bell and lights made for a rather expensive Sunday.

So, this week I will try a PT session, go see Dr. Johnson on Friday and see what's what. I'm fairly certain, however, that I will need surgery based on the pain I am constantly experiencing. Sucks.