rider1960
post-grad
I have arthritis (significantly decreased joint space and large spurs on the femoral head and acetabulum) in the left hip and a lesser degree of degeneration in the right. The right has a moderate amount of pain, but the left is very painful, mostly in the groin. I can't do anything without a lot of pain--simply walking through my house is painful and sometimes I can barely move the left leg. I also have weakness and can't flex my knee up off the floor (while sitting) or off the bed (lying down) more an an inch, which to me is frightening. It's really getting to me and I can't do any activity that I used to like to do, such as ride my horse, go for a walk with my dogs, hike, go shopping at the mall, etc. Even walking to the restroom at work is difficult.
I ran into a lot of misdiagnoses along the way and have been dealing with pain and dysfunction of this severity for almost 2 years. I just finally found an ortho who specializes in hips that finally attributed my pain to the hip--thank goodness! This was end of July 2011. I've had hip injections that gave me about 2 months of about 50% relief but they have worn off and a repeat one 2 weeks ago hasn't done a thing. I'm taking the max amount of anti-inflammatories (for 2 years straight) just to be able to do my basic life requirements and be able to keep working at my sedentary job--thank God I have a sedentary job, or I know I wouldn't be able to work.
The hip ortho surgeon I've been seeing really IS very skilled and knowledgable and is considered by his peers to be excellent and one of the tops in his field. I believe he knows his stuff.
The problem--I am significantly overweight and he has told me "lose weight or you are looking at bilateral hip replacements" and doesn't want to entertain a hip replacement surgery until I find out if the weight loss makes my pain go away. More specifically, he keeps telling me that if I lose at least 50 pounds my pain will be relieved.
I realize I'll feel *better* after losing weight ... but I seriously doubt it will cause the pain to get *that* much better that I will be able to do everything I did before and basically be as good as new, as he keeps preaching. I've lost 7 pounds so far, but the weight comes off slow because I can't exercise to burn off calories--diet is the only thing I have to rely on. Even walking in a pool increases the pain to an intolerable level because it feels like there is a knife sticking in my groin with every move of the leg, whether I have weight on it or not (from the bone spurs, I'm guessing?). I feel like by doing this "wait and see" approach, which I honestly think is an unrealistic plan of action considering my degree of arthritis, I'm just losing precious time that I could be spending recovering from surgery and getting my life back on track and feel I should schedule surgery but continue to work on my weight loss during the wait time and get just it over with and get my life back. I have felt like this way too long already.
I would like to know about others' experiences when they have lost considerable weight and if that lessened their pain and improved their function to the point where they could do active things again and didn't need the hip replacement. I know the arthritis itself isn't going to go away and the doctor certainly hasn't said that. I'm talking about how well you felt painwise and your ability to function despite the arthriits ... or did you still have enough pain and dysfunction to require the surgery.
I ran into a lot of misdiagnoses along the way and have been dealing with pain and dysfunction of this severity for almost 2 years. I just finally found an ortho who specializes in hips that finally attributed my pain to the hip--thank goodness! This was end of July 2011. I've had hip injections that gave me about 2 months of about 50% relief but they have worn off and a repeat one 2 weeks ago hasn't done a thing. I'm taking the max amount of anti-inflammatories (for 2 years straight) just to be able to do my basic life requirements and be able to keep working at my sedentary job--thank God I have a sedentary job, or I know I wouldn't be able to work.
The hip ortho surgeon I've been seeing really IS very skilled and knowledgable and is considered by his peers to be excellent and one of the tops in his field. I believe he knows his stuff.
The problem--I am significantly overweight and he has told me "lose weight or you are looking at bilateral hip replacements" and doesn't want to entertain a hip replacement surgery until I find out if the weight loss makes my pain go away. More specifically, he keeps telling me that if I lose at least 50 pounds my pain will be relieved.
I realize I'll feel *better* after losing weight ... but I seriously doubt it will cause the pain to get *that* much better that I will be able to do everything I did before and basically be as good as new, as he keeps preaching. I've lost 7 pounds so far, but the weight comes off slow because I can't exercise to burn off calories--diet is the only thing I have to rely on. Even walking in a pool increases the pain to an intolerable level because it feels like there is a knife sticking in my groin with every move of the leg, whether I have weight on it or not (from the bone spurs, I'm guessing?). I feel like by doing this "wait and see" approach, which I honestly think is an unrealistic plan of action considering my degree of arthritis, I'm just losing precious time that I could be spending recovering from surgery and getting my life back on track and feel I should schedule surgery but continue to work on my weight loss during the wait time and get just it over with and get my life back. I have felt like this way too long already.
I would like to know about others' experiences when they have lost considerable weight and if that lessened their pain and improved their function to the point where they could do active things again and didn't need the hip replacement. I know the arthritis itself isn't going to go away and the doctor certainly hasn't said that. I'm talking about how well you felt painwise and your ability to function despite the arthriits ... or did you still have enough pain and dysfunction to require the surgery.