Nope, Nada, Not Me!!!

Those are the words I told my doctor when he finally discovered the source of my pain. The pain had become so severe that I could barely walk half a block. I am not even going to talk about "my limp" also known as the gangster lean I developed. Only my family and a few friends knew how much pain I was in on a daily basis. I hid it from everyone else.

I continued to teach my classes via Zoom and taught Dance Fitness in the park weekly with some of my favorite instructors. Whenever someone asked about my limp, I just told them that I pulled a muscle. As long as I brought my intensity, sense of humor, and the "Shelly swag", my students were happy. Everyone was happy except for me. I was in pain.

Eventually it got to the point where I had to stop teaching in the park and could only teach via Zoom. I stopped leaving my house because the farthest I could walk was the corner store...and it took forever. This is about the time I developed an unhealthy and expensive relationship with Amazon Prime. I was desperate and couldn't continue to live confined to my house even though the gyms were still closed.

My doctor told me that I needed a total hip replacement but I told him, "no, not me, I am too young!" I was turning 50 years old in a couple of months and did not want to have surgery. This was going to be a big birthday and I wanted to celebrate. It was an ego thing. So, I opted for the painful shot of cortisone in my hip. It was an uncomfortable procedure that only lasted three weeks instead of the three months. It was a glorious three weeks until the pain returned. I am so glad that I scheduled the surgery, just in case the shot didn't work. I spent way too much time reading posts in the various hip replacement groups on Facebook. I was warned the shot might not work, so schedule the surgery as a back up. I am glad I did.

Now, I look back on how stupid I was to put off the surgery because I was worried about what others would think. I didn't want to hear "I told you so" from anyone. You know the ones who would blame Zumba, my marathoners, not stretching, my weight, all of the classes I was teaching weekly, ....... I was already stressing out and I didn't need anyone else to stress me out. So I had the surgery the day after I taught my last "Stix" class. I told my students I was taking a break and that was it. In my next entry, I will talk about the first couple of weeks post surgery, including pooping in the bag. My medical team prepared me for the physical aspect of recovering from the surgery, but not the mental one. The struggle was and still is real.

Btw, I had a small dinner with my family for my 50th birthday due to Covid.