big needles!

Make pain my b!tch, huh? Well I'm sitting in bed with my leg propped up on two big pillows after getting sent home following "the injection" with two bottles of prescription painkillers. This was the blood centrifuging machine...for size reference, check out the magazines in the upper right corner:

"The injection" is in quotes because the needle was so big (in order for the platelets to get through or something) that it required multiple smaller injections of novocaine to numb up the area before the MULTIPLE site injections of PRP. I'm trying not to sound like a super wuss, but I was limping my way through the pharmacy and have strict orders to take the next 3 days completely off training. Then very slowly build back up again.

It's like one of those "it's gonna get worse before it gets better" kinda things. I'm not suppose to take any sorts of anti-inflammatories because the idea is that we WANT inflammation to promote the healing process. Hmmm...so am I not supposed to be following my super healthy anti-inflammatory diet right now? ;)

On the bright side, the MRI report shows my injury is actually a muscle tear of the VMO, with only minor ligamentous involvement. So that's an update on the initially suspected MPFL tear--but the MPFL and VMO tendon combine as I very skillfully described before, so it was hard to differentiate on the ultrasound. This is actually GOOD NEWS because muscles have much better blood supply than ligaments, so my recovery time will be relatively quicker! Not surprisingly, there was still evidence of a bone bruise on my femur 3.5 months post-crash, albeit a minor one that won't be causing much trouble.

My activity is going to be more limited than it's been in the last couple months (ugh did I really do an ironman on this thing?!), but like the doc said, my job is just to heal now! Send happy healing vibes, thanks :)