Thursday, July 08, 2010

Self-Medication

Now that this situation is over, per se, I can talk about it. Something strange happened to my right arm after the fiber festival and I had no idea what was going on. First, the muscles in my upper and lower arm, as well as the elbow joint, began to hurt very badly. There were dull aches and at times, sharp, dagger-like pains. Then, I noticed a really large lump under the skin of my forearm. Initially, I thought I had bruised myself helping break down vendor set ups, but the bump kept getting larger and the pain, more intense.


I went to the doctor and had the lump examined. In a nutshell, she said it was either a non-cancerous lipoma (aka "mutant fat cell") or a lymphoma. An ultrasound showed it was a lipoma (whoo! and yay!) and now it was time to deal with the muscular/joint issues. I went to the orthopaedist yesterday and after the examination, he stated that I have tennis elbow.


"Do you play?" Dr. Henning asked.
"Dude, look at me. What the hell do you
think?" I thought.
"No, I knit...rabidly," I replied.
"Well, we'll take care of this right now."


And I was given a cortisone shot in the ligament. I hate shots. Have I ever told you that? I really, really loathe needles. My veins are hard to find and my record of IV attempts is 12 tries! I've spent the better part of my life trying to avoid shots. Ask me sometime about avoiding a series of shots in the Cote d'Ivoire/Ivory Coast Airport in Africa. There's a little man in a dirty lab coat there who thinks Bill Clinton and I are lovers.

One railroad spike later, I do feel better. My arm doesn't hurt nearly as much, but that could be the codeine talking at this point. Anyway, next time my elbow kicks up, I plan on self-medicating...Aspercream and vodka. Wanna join me?

5 comments:

Marianne said...

Holy Crap, Dana!
I'm beyond relieved to hear your lump turned out to be a lipoma (whew!) and damnit, that's not tennis elbow, that's knitter's elbow.. and oh egads, the Shot. Have never had one of those but Aardron did a couple of times when he was young. dang.
Yes. Yes, I'll join you, any old time, any place :^D

Anonymous said...

I don't have to tell you how happy I am that it turned out to be a lipoma!!! I've had one of those shots in my hip years ago and I'm with you - self-medicate with vodka and, um, well, I'd choose something a bit stronger than Aspercreme.

Nana Sadie said...

I hope you're feeling lots better today! (I hate shots, too, but those cortizone things when the inflammation is bad? Well...as the commercials all say "PRICELESS!")
(((hugs)))

Jadielady said...

Be careful with those cortisone shots. A lot of doctors like them because (according to my mom) they can bill them as surgery. But they also deteriorate the bone. Temporary fix! So there are perfectly valid reasons not to like needles (unless they have ink in them *wink wink)

Anonymous said...

oh..and here I am dragging up the rear..but I'm so relieved that it will be better after this injection..argh..let's not discuss needles..you know my addiction to them..I dread those weekly/bi-monthly itty bitty allergy needles..so don't even think of coming near me with that horse sized needle..We're on the same page with IV's..etc..I have a really ugly track record with those guys~..glad you're on the mend..love you~