Let's go back to the beginnig

   I jumped the gun and posted out of order, so let me start from the beginning. My name is Sheena, I'm 28 years old and I am about to have arthroscopic hip surgery on May 22.

Around 2010 I started to gain weight. I am 5'2" and wound up weighing 140lbs. Now I know that doesn't sound too bad but it really is overweight for my height. I decided to start running to help lose weight. I had always hated and been terrible at running. I would run maybe a .25 mile and stop to walk. It was embarrassing but I kept at it. I ran a 5K in almost 38min. Not good but I wanted to get better. I had caught the running bug. I found myself getting faster and it became easier to run without stopping to walk. Last year I won 1st place in my age group (4th overall female) on a very hilly course in the August heat with a time of 25:50. Amazing what hard work will do and I love running. I ran my 1st Half Marathon last year and had signed up to do another half in April, but my hip stopped that from happening.

I then found CrossFit and that changed everything. I fell in love with lifting, Never in my life did I think I would enjoy Olympic Lifting, but I did and I became obsessed. I kept getting better and stronger. I began to go 5 days a week if I wasn't too sore. I was in the best shape of my life. I had muscles. My running improved. I finally was getting a flatter, better stomach. I have always had a pooch that I just cannot get rid of. I had never wore a bikini in my entire adult life until 2 years ago. I wasn't 100% satisfied with my body, I wasn't quite where I wanted, but I was happy with myself and proud of the work I had put in. I liked what I saw in the mirror. I started to wear clothes that I have NEVER attempted to wear. I was on top of the world..... until the day before my 28th birthday. I stood up out of a chair to go to lunch and my hip popped. It hurt but it didn't hinder me from walking. Everything on my body pops and cracks so I didn't think much of it....but as the day progressed the achy pain didn't go away. I went to CrossFit for 3 more days just working through the pain. It didn't hurt doing the exercises but it was so painful afterwards. At one point at home I was squatting down on the ground working on a blanket project and when I tried to stand up I felt the most excruciating pain trying to stand up. It was almost impossible to move my leg and that's when I knew I had to go to the doctor.

I went to a sports medicine Dr at my hospital and they treated me as having an Illiopsoas strain. I was told to stop working out entirely and to go to physical therapy 2x/week for 1 month. I went and did everything I was told to do but I was still in pain, if not more pain. I work in Radiology and am very cool with our radiologists so one of them said he would give me a cortisone injection to see if it would help with my pain. It may have taken the edge off slightly but that lasted maybe 1 week tops.

After 1 month of unsuccessful PT I stopped going and had an MRI Arthrogram done. They inject dye into your hip joint and then you have the MRI. I was told that I had a labral tear. I was in extreme pain after this test. The dye just sits in your joint and is inflamed because it's not supposed to be in there. I was limping for 4 days straight. I was even sent home from work because I was visibly in so much pain.

My sports med Dr suggested I go see a surgeon at the Cleveland Clinic. Both he and the surgeon said that I could not have the surgery and basically deal with my pain. I could try more PT and cut back on my active lifestyle but in reality I would be just prolonging having a hip replacement 30 years down the line. As much I was don't want to have surgery, I don't want to cut back on my fitness routine. I love working out. Not only do I need to workout to keep up my body (I have to work at what I have. I am not lucky enough to just eat what I want) I need to workout because it's something I love doing...it's my hobby...my sanity. I am so young. I can't deal with this pain forever. I am an xray tech and I have a very physically demanding job. That doesn't help any either. May I also add that there are maybe 5 drs in all of Ohio that do arthroscopic hip surgeries. That says a lot about this surgery. It's still kinda new to medicine to fix these tears. There are so many things going on in the hip area. Some injuries, like tears, are often confused as other injuries. The surgeon at Cleveland Clinic also told me that I have FAI- Femoroacetabular Impingement. This means that the head of my femur isn't smooth and it is rubbing in my hip joint which tore my labrum. There are 2 kinds of impingements. A CAM (which he said is what I have) is when there is a bump/or more bone on the head of the femur so it's not fitting in the socket properly. There is also a PINCER where there is a little overgrowth of bone on the acetabulum itself (the socket). You can also end up with a Mixed Impingement which is a combo of both. He also said that 25% of his patients have  FAI bilaterally. This is something you are born with so it is not going to heal on its own and if untreated it will continue to tear my labrum more. It can then break down the cartilage in the rest of your hip leading to a replacement. With all of this info I felt I had no choice but to have the surgery.

I began reading blogs from people who have had the same procedure done and it has been so helpful to have an idea of what to expect and it's nice to have people who are going thru the same things you are. That is why I decided to document my journey thru surgery and recovery. I hope what I have to say helps someone else like it has for me.