OT: Here's the deal..., It's gonna be a long last half of the year... Options

[dbgriffith75]

So I went to the orthopaedic surgeon about my shoulder on Monday, as scheduled, and after examining me and taking a look at the MRI, he basically told me, and of course I'm paraphrasing here "I don't want to f**k with it, I'm referring you to a specialist." (IMG:style_emoticons/default/confused24.gif) Uhm, okay?

So I was lucky enough to get an appointment scheduled with him yesterday, and I went, and here's what I found out. (If you didn't read my original post about this, I found out I have a cyst in my shoulder.)

If you're somewhat familiar with the human body, you know there's a cup in your shoulder that accepts the ball of the joint. There's a tendon that runs the rim of that cup, and on the back side it's torn. Because of that tear, fluid in the joint is leaking out and that's what's causing the cyst; hence the cyst is causing the tendonitis, pain, and weakness in the muscles in that area.

His words exactly: For as big as it is, I'm surprised you didn't have problems with it sooner than you did. So I ask him how big is it? About the size of a nickel. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/blink.gif)

Now for the fun part- what it's going to take to fix it. Luckily, it's just an orthoscopic procedure, so they won't have to actually open the shoulder up. Good news there. Bad news is that I'm going to have to miss 7-10 days of work immediately following the surgery, after which I can return to work but on restriction only as my arm will be in a sling for 6 weeks. And a total rehab time of 4-6 months.

I'm glad I'll be getting it fixed, but what sucks is that in my line of work (truck driving, forklift operation) I basically can't work if I'm on restriction. The only way I can continue to go to work is if they can find something for me to do in the office. Unfortunately I can't figure any of that out right now because the terminal manager is on vacation this week, so I'm going to have to wait until Monday to see if there's anything we can work out.

But then, as if the stress levels weren't high enough in the household, I'm getting married Aug. 2, and my wife to be was looking forward to surprising our families with a wicked sweet first dance. If I have the surgery pre-wedding, it won't happen as my shoulder will be in no condition for it. On the other hand my wife to be doesn't want me to wait any longer than necessary as she's told me in the past week, I've been waking up screaming in pain in the middle of the night. I personally have no recollection of doing this as I'm a very heavy sleeper, but I can feel it when I get up in the mornings. For the past few weeks, vicoden has been a part of my balanced breakfast. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/wacko.gif) Not that I'm complaining about having to take vicoden- it's the whole wanting to rip my arm off in the mornings part.

The doc did tell me that for as young as I am, it's not going to hurt anything if I want to wait a while to have the surgery done as long I'm willing to put up with the pain. And I was talking to the office gal at work about it last night and she said now is actually a good time to get it done as July is always a slow month for us.

But I told my fiancee, I'm at least going to wait until next week to talk to the terminal manager about what we can work out as far as letting me work while I'm on restriction and go from there. I've been a blue collar worker for as long as I can remember, and I love the work that I do, so you can imagine how I feel about sitting in an office while I'm waiting to get healed up. At the same time, I think that if I just sit around the house for 6 weeks, I'll drive myself and my fiancee to the brink of insanity and beyond.

*shrugs* I'll get something figured out. Until then, I'll just have to make due.