Well, no wonder.
You know how I will periodically complain about my right shoulder flaring up and becoming incredibly painful?
I had an appointment with Dr. P, my rheumatologist this morning, and I mentioned (for the second visit in a row) that my shoulder has been bothering me such that on some days, I can barely move or use my arm at all. Rather than send me for an MRI, they opted to inject my shoulder with cortisone to see if that helps. Hopefully, it will -- I'd much rather have a periodic cortisone injection than an MRI and shoulder surgery. But I digress.
Dr. P's PA gave me the injection under Dr. P's supervision, because she hasn't injected many shoulders and she wanted to make sure she did it correctly. I must say, I couldn't tell that she was inexperienced at it, because despite the fact that the needle was enormous and I was terrified at the sight of it (and I am not one to freak out at the sight of a needle), I barely felt a thing. But I digress some more.
Dr. P poked around on my shoulder for awhile to find the best spot to inject it, and it turns out that my shoulder is built all wrong, which helps to explain why it hurts so much. The RA is only part of it -- the rest of the pain is apparently due to the fact that my shoulder just isn't put together right. Dr. P was poking around on it and kept saying stuff to his PA like, "Huh. This is very unusual. You feel this right here? It's supposed to be back over here. No wonder she has a lot of shoulder pain."
Anyhoo, the upshot was that they couldn't even inject it in the spot where they normally would have (in the front of the shoulder). They had to inject it from the back. Fortunately, my small size made it easier for them to do it that way than it would have been if I were larger. As Dr. P noted, "She's really skinny, so you can feel exactly where to put the needle. That makes it a lot easier on us and a lot less painful for her." Woohoo!
So, it seems that I am a really skinny freak with an alien shoulder. I swear, nothing about me can ever be normal. But the good news is that the injection didn't hurt, and my shoulder isn't too terribly sore this evening -- they warned me that it might be very sore for a day or two, but it's only a wee bit tender. With any luck, the cortisone will keep my shoulder from flaring up for at least a few months.
I had an appointment with Dr. P, my rheumatologist this morning, and I mentioned (for the second visit in a row) that my shoulder has been bothering me such that on some days, I can barely move or use my arm at all. Rather than send me for an MRI, they opted to inject my shoulder with cortisone to see if that helps. Hopefully, it will -- I'd much rather have a periodic cortisone injection than an MRI and shoulder surgery. But I digress.
Dr. P's PA gave me the injection under Dr. P's supervision, because she hasn't injected many shoulders and she wanted to make sure she did it correctly. I must say, I couldn't tell that she was inexperienced at it, because despite the fact that the needle was enormous and I was terrified at the sight of it (and I am not one to freak out at the sight of a needle), I barely felt a thing. But I digress some more.
Dr. P poked around on my shoulder for awhile to find the best spot to inject it, and it turns out that my shoulder is built all wrong, which helps to explain why it hurts so much. The RA is only part of it -- the rest of the pain is apparently due to the fact that my shoulder just isn't put together right. Dr. P was poking around on it and kept saying stuff to his PA like, "Huh. This is very unusual. You feel this right here? It's supposed to be back over here. No wonder she has a lot of shoulder pain."
Anyhoo, the upshot was that they couldn't even inject it in the spot where they normally would have (in the front of the shoulder). They had to inject it from the back. Fortunately, my small size made it easier for them to do it that way than it would have been if I were larger. As Dr. P noted, "She's really skinny, so you can feel exactly where to put the needle. That makes it a lot easier on us and a lot less painful for her." Woohoo!
So, it seems that I am a really skinny freak with an alien shoulder. I swear, nothing about me can ever be normal. But the good news is that the injection didn't hurt, and my shoulder isn't too terribly sore this evening -- they warned me that it might be very sore for a day or two, but it's only a wee bit tender. With any luck, the cortisone will keep my shoulder from flaring up for at least a few months.
posted by Catherine at 8:42 PM
4 Comments:
So much for intelligent design.
I'm tellin' ya. Someone really screwed up when they were putting me together.
And I spoke too soon about not being in any pain after the injection. My shoulder was killing me today. That cortisone better kick in soon. Dammit.
hope your shoulder flare is better ... yikes, eh ...you and rick could sure swap stories about weird things happening to you!
we had friends drop by the other day ... she has one kidney, he has one arm - they are in their 70's ... the dark humour flowed freely!
i've got a cold from my trip ... so it's off to bed ... nite nite!
Welcome back, Saija! I hope you had a great trip and that your cold goes away immediately.
Your friends sound like my kinda people -- I'm a big fan of dark humor. :)
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