Knee Replacement 14: Round 2, Bring it?
Everyone at Heiden Orthopedics in Sandy, Utah, knows my name. They smile when I walk in and are so pleased with the progress on knee replacement #1 that they’re just dying to know if I’m ready for bone sawing day number two, just six days away.
Bring it, I say.
Push in on Knee Boy’s brave face, his bright smile. This guy is just fearless!
Of course, it’s all an act.
As I drive home, the façade slips and I’m fading to black, sinking below the surface. For the last two weeks, I’ve had descending moments like this, but thankfully, I’ve been able to wriggle free and return to the sunlight. Now that I’m officially cleared for surgery in six days, the dark currents have reclaimed control.
I know that in the end, this is the right thing to do for my life, my family, and long-term happiness, but today’s reality is leaden. I’m finally getting some sleep at night, and I’m walking around without crutches. The pain’s receding, and physical therapy is progressing.
And now I’m going to start it all over again?
It would be easy to pick up the phone, Hey Doc, whaddya say we postpone this thing until, next year, or maybe … fucking never. One quick call and I’d be a hundred pounds lighter. And maybe I don’t even have to call.
Siri, text Heiden Orthopdeics.
Okay, what do you want the text to say?
Sorry, doc, I lost my nerve. It’s been nice knowing ya.
I’d float back to the surface of my life, happily discovering that I’m six weeks down the road to recovery. Past the painkillers, breathing easy, stroking toward shore. It's not that I’m worried about the second surgery—Park City Hospital is excellent, and Dr. Heiden and his whole team have it dialed—but the descent into another dark month, the wobbly rehab restart, and the return to square one all brings the myth of Sisyphus to mind.
Exhausted by the mixed metaphors, I drive home and push up the garage door.
Rolling the Husqvarna Norden 901 out of the garage is problematic. It’s been nearly six weeks since she moved, and her space has been invaded by rakes, a lawnmower, an edger, and other aggressive garden tools. My wife has been working on the front yard, and my favorite motorcycle has been reduced to a leaning post. I clear the suburban armory and then have to pick up the back of the bike to skooch it over and get it straight. I put all my weight on my right leg, the uncut one, and haruumph the bike sideways. In doing so, I’m reminded that if I drop my 500-pound girlfriend, there will be no way to pick her up with this bum leg.
Okay then, just don’t drop her.
I back her out of the drive, rolling carefully over the little ramp that brings us to the street. Thumbing the little red button with my right hand, Nordy gurgles to life, stutters, and then starts to purr. Just the sound of that engine is enough to lift me.
I check the tires by pushing down on them with my hand. There’s a gauge around here somewhere, but I don’t want to sacrifice momentum by taking the time to find it. Anyway, they seem firm enough, and I give her a once-over before swinging my right leg carefully over the saddle. In position, leaning the bike on my good side, I bend my left leg until my foot settles on the peg. That hurts. Apparently, a bit more than 120 degrees of motion in your knee is needed for comfort, at least on the shifter side, where it’s quite important to position your foot properly. Still, a little pain is a small price to pay for freedom and so, canting my hip to compensate, I shift her into gear and roll down the road.
Motion is magic.
I slowly stand on the pegs and test things by rocking the bike from side to side, slaloming down the street. It feels all right. No, it feels better than all right; it feels like home. How long has it been? Forty days and forty nights of pain and bed and ice and these drugs to stave off the pain and those drugs to try to sleep, and now there’s wind and the throttle and the canyon walls lying back and welcoming us. Velocity vanquishes those dark forty days and forty nights and I feel a positively biblical sense of renewal.
If you ride motorcycles, you will understand that I am not exaggerating. If you do not ride motorcycles, I beg your forgiveness on the grounds that I hail from a long line of hyperbolic windbags, sultans of the story stretch, complete bullshit artists. It’s hard to shake that lineage; in order to do so, one would actually have to try.
Anyway, here’s the point: somehow, a simple motorcycle ride up a winding canyon leaves me with the strength to park the bike, sit down with a notepad, and write down rehab goals, as well as dates for resuming specific activities. The list is boring, and the goals are overly ambitious, but it serves its purpose: to help me resist making the chicken-out call for the next six days.
And then it’s 4 am and I am drinking the prescribed Gatorade and black coffee (thank God that’s an allowed pre-surgery substance) and driving to Park City, where, like the veteran I am, I will skate through the intake, the pre-dawn discussions, the knee shaving and IV insertions. Then it’s release signing and leg initialing with the Sharpie and a kiss from my wife before rolling into a realm of heightened energy and masked bustling. Dr. Heiden’s eyes will be the last I see before drifting away under the bright, cold lights.