GOING FOR THE OP- (PART ONE)

In the past magazine I told you a little of my injury woes, so now I think I may as well start you all on a running commentary. I can imagine your excitement at this glorious news, so I will crack on with my moaning and groaning about my ailments.

A quick recap is in order first I suppose as some of you may not have read my last story of crippling set backs or have managed to forget that last load of drivel. My main injury at the moment and the one I am actually telling you about is my knackered Achilles tendon, done playing football about 15 years ago originally. Due to my physical work, (Golf Course Green keeper), and my physical hobbies, the injury has progressively got worse despite continual attempts at different therapies. So it is now at a point of taking drastic measures to repair the tendon.

Surgery is the only course of action I hadn’t taken and never really had been keen on as it isn’t always 100% successful. I decided to consult a sports injury specialist, (Mick Edge), in the end to get his opinion. As he has been through surgery recently he managed to give me the motivation to head back to the doctors and push for something to be done and, to my utter astonishment, the doctor referred me to a specialist.

I also struck lucky by being sent to a private hospital, as Blackpool Vic didn’t have any spaces in their appointment book for me. So off to Fylde Coast Hospital to be seen by a surgeon. Within five minutes he had checked the tendon out and told me it definitely needed to go under the knife. I can’t wait! I was quite stunned to see that he had even read through all my notes before I had even entered his room, which has never happened in the 15 years that I have gone back and forth to the Vic.

So I am booked in for surgery on 26^th October and am thinking what a waste of money it was entering the Wesham 10k online months ago! Hopefully I will be mobile enough to marshal, as I have never even been to the race before and Angela, (my wife), may be expecting a bit of support as she races round.

Next time I will give you a full update of how the operation has gone in all its most graphic detail but for now here is a quick run down of what is to be done to me. First is an incision and the skin is peeled back, then the sheath that the tendon lives inside is totally removed, (a bit like removing a condom after use I suppose?) Lastly, incisions are made deep into the tendon to stimulate new blood to flow into it and make it regenerate. Then I am stitched back up and sent home into Angela’s nursing care.

Hopefully, if it all goes well, I will be back running a little around Christmas time, so should be fully fit again towards Spring. If it doesn’t go well I will just hobble to training and blame Mick for talking me into it, only joking!

Written by: Charles Colby

Submitted: 28^th September 2010

Edited by: Brenda J Earnshaw WRR Publications Editor