Shoot from the hip? It hurts too much

I recently learned that I’m going to need a hip replacement. I don’t know at this point whose hip it will be, but if I had my druthers it would be someone like Van Morrison or, if I’m lucky and get a younger hip, maybe Jon Stewart’s.

I’m joking about this turn of events, but only because I haven’t repressed my feelings enough to ignore the matter completely.

The hip’s been bothering me for some time, but I didn’t push the issue the first time I saw the doctor.

Initially, he used the standard poke-around-‘til-it-hurts diagnostic tool – his pointer finger – until he found the sweet spot that made me yelp like a chipmunk.

If I remember correctly, his initial diagnosis had something to do with a bursa sack, which sounds a bit like the embroidered bags people in Uzbekistan use for bank deposits.

The doctor prescribed three self-help exercises, one of which I do because it eases my conscience and doesn’t hurt as much as the other two.

When I returned to the doctor last week, he bent my leg this way and that to determine how much range of motion I had compared to the good leg. That’s the one I hop around on when the hip’s really hurting, and I darn well consider myself lucky to have at least one leg to stand on.

I joke about these things, but I do want my doctor to know I appreciate his thoroughness and sound judgment. I have faith in him.

I also like the fact that I don’t have to wait two hours to see him, which is a godsend for someone who packed lunch, The New York Times crossword puzzle and a Dostoyevsky novel when he went to see the retina specialist.

Last week, after the family doctor concluded my hip had the range of motion of a steel beam, he ordered an X-ray. I’d assumed that any effective look inside the body would take something at least as time-consuming and acronym-intensive as an MRI or a CT scan.

But I was wrong.

The actual X-ray and a quick consult with the doctor took maybe 20 minutes, which is far easier on the schedule than the five or six weeks it will take to get up, complain and learn to walk again after a hip replacement.

It turns out I have severe arthritis around the hip joint that has resulted in a bone-on-bone situation in the socket. And I thought I was grinding my teeth! I guess it explains why I drag the left leg like a frozen side of beef.

It can be painful at times, but generally I’ve learned to cope with it, thanks to these compression sleeves and skin-tight Spandex shorts I wear to support the area by completely cutting off the circulation.

It’s like they say in hockey: No blood, no pain.

It’s hard to admit, but what really bothers me about the hip is walking in front of a storefront window and seeing myself gimp along. I try to fool myself by hiding it, but a hidden limp is just a another word for nothin’ left to lose.

I also have this fear that if I bump into something just the right way the hip will shatter, leaving nothing but a pile of arthritic bone, socket shards and tattered compression shorts in a smoldering heap on the ground.

This morning I woke up and begin thinking about what the actual operation would entail. When I got to the electric saw part I passed out and fell back to sleep. Then I dreamed about what the new hip would be made of, assuming it’s not Van Morrison’s but something plastic or a space-age metal.

These morbid thoughts will pass, at least once I move on to the next phase of irrational speculation, which is one of my strengths. What I’ll wonder then is if my first meal after surgery will taste as good as the tuna sandwich I had after that knee surgery a few years back.

I earned that sandwich by hurting and pushing on the call button all night to ask the nurse for more pain meds. Maybe it was the drugs and all that exertion that made the tuna taste so good.

I remember that same day the nurse got me up on crutches so I could learn to use them on the stairs. I had to wonder, why the stairs and not a flat surface?

I figure hospitals must have great insurance, what with the accident risks they take with recovering orthopedic patients. That’s not to mention the way they boot everyone out so soon after surgery.

I’ll put off the surgery and all those bothersome details as long as I can, but first thing in the morning I plan to get to work. Completely repressing things doesn’t happen overnight.

This story was originally published October 25, 2016 at 4:43 PM with the headline "Shoot from the hip? It hurts too much."