…that we are getting old.

I will be limping around at the reunion due to having torn my ACL this summer. The cool version of the story is that I did so playing soccer. The actual, full story is less cool. I did in fact hurt my knee playing soccer, in the goal as usual. However, I didn’t do it in a dramatic fashion but rather jumped up, not very high, to try to tip a little header over the top of the goal. I got a hand on it, barely, and pushed it into the bar. But as I came down on my knee, it hyperextended and I was instantly on the ground.

In years not that far past, I would have probably reacted quicker and had better technique, and would have either caught the ball or got more of it, and definitely would have come down less awkwardly. However, that didn’t happen.

Fortunately, my wife’s sister’s husband is an orthopedic surgeon, and they live just down the road. (And my wife’s sister is a pediatrician–we’re really set on the medical front.) Ramon determined that the LCL was sprained and that I might return to the summer soccer league in four to six weeks.

After four weeks, my knee was somewhat better but not better enough to start playing again. It was better enough to mow the yard. I accomplished the riding mower part without harming myself. Then I went to start trimming with the push mower, yanked the starting cord and stepped back, and my knee totally collapsed. It hurt maybe 20 times more than it had the first time, and whatever was not torn in the first incident was now.

So I’m having knee surgery on August 26. Apparently you need crutches for a week or so, and since it’s my right knee, I can’t drive for up to four weeks. It’s six months before you can do anything real athletic, and a year before you can try that without a brace, which I don’t plan to do. I plan to wear a brace for years to come. I might even get one for my left knee, just in case.

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