I Have a Bad Feeling About This

Back in September, I wrote about my most recent injury. Short story: I felt something in my shoulder area pop when I pushed the sprinkler into the ground. The kind folks at the walk-in clinic said it was a strained pectoral muscle, and it should feel better in two to four weeks.

Six months later, the constant pain and lack of sleep finally sent me to the doctor. After two doctor's appointments, an MRI, and a rather painful physical therapy session, I finally have a diagnosis. Because I am not medically inclined, I will use diagrams to explain my condition.

A healthy shoulder:

My screwed-up shoulder:(Mad PhotoShop skillz, I haz dem.)

Apparently, there's a torn supra-something tendon, and a torn labrum (maybe?), and some bursitis. At least I think that's what it is, because my doctor has a pretty heavy accent and I can't always understand her very well. While she was telling me the diagnosis and recommending an orthopedic surgeon, I was surreptitiously reading the MRI results on the computer over her shoulder, so that I might have some comprehension of what she was saying.

It looks like the next step is the orthopedic surgeon...on March 19th. That was the earliest available appointment. Thanks, guys. I should be a raving Lortab addict by then. Until then, I will have two torture, um, physical therapy sessions each week. If you've never needed any kind of physical therapy, you should consider yourself lucky. They do all kinds of weird things to you there. But that will be the topic for my next post, I think.