Where do I start ?

I'm sitting here with just less than 2 weeks to go before I have a total hip replacement at 35, wondering how I ended up in this situation ? I'm pretty organised in the practical sense but it's the unknown that holds the biggest fear just now. Will the operation be a success ? Will the pain really be gone afterwards ? How long will it be until I 'get my life back' ?

I won't bore you with a long history but as it's my blog and therefore my story.. here's a bit of background....

I was born with CDH, or congenital hip dysplasia for those of you outside the hip club, but it wasn't picked up until at the age of around 14 months when I began trying to walk but couldn't. This was a bit of a giveaway that something was wrong and my mum discovered that my left hip was dislocated as the left hip socket hadn't formed properly. Fast forward through months in plaster following a femoral osteotomy (basically where the femur is broken and reset to encourage the hip socket to grow around it and improve the coverage) and a plate which was in my leg until I was about 5.

Although I couldn't ever do the splits and wasn't great at running, I basically had a pretty normal childhood and had no real problems until my mid 20's. I always knew though that at some point I would need a hip replacement, possibly in my 50's. Every few years, my hip would flare up and cause problems with getting in and out of cars, or running and I would go back to an orthopaedic consultant for a check up. In my late 20's the pain in the hip increased significantly and I had an MRI arthrogram (injection into the joint which allows the soft tissues to be seen on x ray) which showed a small tear in the lining of the joint.

This eventually settled down and I was fine again until the summer of 2007 when things started to go badly wrong in the hip. After a lovely weekend in Paris and lots of walking, I was left unable to walk far and in huge amounts of pain. Explorations found that I had trochanteric bursitis and this led eventually in early 2008 to having open surgery on the left hip to have the bursa removed (after physio, cortisone injections etc all failed) and at the same time I had a tendon lengthened and the surgeon found my gluteus media muscle had torn - so he very kindly reattached it.

12 weeks later I got off the crutches and was recovering well and almost pain free. In August 2008 however I tore the cartiladge in the left hip again and almost straightaway I was unable to walk any distance, stand on the spot for any length of time without severe pain and discomfort. After xrays, ultrasounds and finally another MRI Arthrogram a tear was diagnosed and my surgeon advised that an arthroscopy (keyhole surgery into the hip) would allow him to look inside the joint, repair the tear and assess the condition of the joint.

This happened in March 2009 and he did repair the tear but unfortunately found that the condition of the joint was poor, arthritis had set in and there were two significant patches of damage to the joint. His view was that the next step was a total hip replacement (THR) and that I would probably need it done in 18 months time.

So here I am, nearly a year on from that having made the decision that my activity level is compromised enough (more on that later) and pain levels are enough to warrant getting on with the THR now and worrying about the consequences in 15 years or so (most replacements last 15-20 years these days if you're good)...

Roll on 27th January !