So I met with my surgeon, Bradley Nelson out of Tria Orthopedics in Bloomington, MN yesterday at 2 PM. He did my brother’s 2nd knee surgery 2 years ago, and I’m excited to have him do mine as well. He immediately remembered my dad and my brother when we went into the office. He was really thorough and I immediately felt comfortable with him. 

He read my MRI results from Thailand and reevaluated my knee for surgery. He said that we’ll be operating on my ACL and possibly my lateral meniscus- he sees that it’s a bit torn, but I may not need surgery on it, recovery may be enough. When he goes in for surgery, he’ll take a better look and decide whether or not to operate. He mentioned though that he’s concerned about my MCL, which ironically enough is the only part of my knee that’s been hurting in the past few weeks. Fortunately, with MCL’s they don’t always require surgery and most of the time a few months of physio is actually enough. He explained everything that he can do for me and said I would benefit from knee surgery since I love things like snowboarding, surfing, hiking and an active lifestyle in general. 

He also gave me the “go ahead” to be moving around as much as I want! He told me to use this time that I have to focus on working out, swimming, and stationary bicycle to make my knee and my body as strong as possible before I go in for surgery! This was the most exciting news of all! This morning I had my first kick ass workout with my mom! We did 45 minutes of hardcore weights then I rode the stationary bike until I was dripping sweat! I even used a good amount of resistance and my knee handled it just fine! It felt really good to be moving and sweating. It felt amazing to be walking both up AND down the stairs without doing it one step at a time. I’m moving and shaking like I haven’t been at all in the past 5 weeks. Now I know I can start pushing myself even harder! It’s astounding how quick our bodies recover. I think that’s pretty cool! 

So… drumroll… the date is officially 12:20 on April 15th!!! It’s not nearly as early as I wanted, but my doctor has a contract with the Gopher’s from the University of Minnesota, as well as the NBA and the NFL. Currently lots of big events are happening for the NBA and NFL, such as the Frozen Four, so if any of these athletes hurts themselves they can get into surgery right away, so he has to make some “free space” just incase. Understandable, I won’t pout, I’m not a professional athlete! But I’m excited to finally have a date, and I’m going to spend the next month working my ass off to get in really good shape before my surgery. And afterwards, I’m going to work myself silly to get my knee and myself into the best shape of our lives.

I’ve realized that I’ve been complaining I didn’t have enough time to continue to lead this active lifestyle of mine in the past few years, and be careful what you wish for because the higher power just gave me a WHOLE LOT of time to myself to do just that! I think it’s a sign to get back into working out, getting in shape, and focusing on me for a bit. I’m gonna take this very seriously and I’m looking forward to seeing all the small goals that I’ll accomplish over the next 7 months. It’ll make me realize how strong my body is and how resilient we really are! 

Be thankful for your body. You have the perfect body if it works! Take care of your temple cuz it’s the only one you got! Here’s to “kicking ass and taking names” as my father would say!