This Is Your Life

I've thought for a while about how I wanted to say this. I'm trying to be serious, for once. But I'm not a complainer, either. I'm not the type to go, "Oh, woe, woe is me, blah blah blah." At least not usually. And look at that, I'm making a joke again. I suppose I should just tell the story...

I think I've mentioned my knee problems in passing, not really in detail though. I was sixteen, and I never had an injury. I started physical therapy in January 2002 to try to avoid surgery. The lateral release was done on my left knee in March of my junior year. I recovered enough to stand at my sister's wedding in May, feel my knee buckle, and go, "Hey. That's the wrong knee!" Did the right one in July (cause I was stubborn and insisted on going on a mission trip to fix houses first).

Why am I bringing all this up? Well, with both knees, it was a long haul- fifteen months of physical therapy, constantly slipping and putting myself farther back, etc. Not to mention having the great timing to be in a wreck just before my senior trip. D.C. on crutches is, well, an experience. But I got through it. And maybe I wasn't the most agile, but then I never was. I took my knees for granted again. Until it came back. I hoped it wasn't happening again, but I knew. I knew when just going to work became painful, when I couldn't stand on my left leg anymore, knew that it was coming back to haunt me.

I do have a really awesome physical therapist, Karen, that I worked with in high school. She seemed optimistic that I might be able to avoid the next surgery up. Of course, that was before my leg gave out and I did a very dramatic almost-face plant on my fourth exercise today. And BBW has been great too (although Subway is now out of the picture). When I told my head manager Kathleen that it would probably be surgery, she was just like "OK, keep me informed, and we can probably make adjustments." And thankfully, neither she nor any of my colleagues who know treat me like an invalid.

But I don't think I thought this far ahead when I was sixteen. I suffered, and I worked, and I got over it. I jumped around and I played Spiderman on the backroom shelves and I lived my life. And now I feel like Frank Gilbreth, plotting every move I make so I don't mess it up more. I believe God has a plan for this. I know God has a plan for this. But I'm grown up now (well, technically). I am going to fight it. But I know, too, that this will always be with me. I'm only twenty years old. And this is my life.