So I had another follow-up appointment with my doctor on Monday. I basically filled him in on all the things I shared in my last hip post.

Running is pretty Ok, though my hip gets tight and sore afterward, but certain yoga poses are still not very comfortable.


A gorgeous fall run along the water on Monday.

The doc did some more tests and then we talked for a bit about surgery and next steps.

The immediate next step is that my doc put me on a very short course of steroids to see if they would help at all with the inflammation and lingering pain.

I go back in two weeks to access progress again.


My 'roids

But the real next step is to decide if I want to do arthroscopic hip surgery.

My doctor told me at this point, it's my choice, and I basically have to decide what level of pain and discomfort I'm OK living with.

And I'll be honest, I don't have a good answer to that question.

There are some days when my hip seems pretty fine. I'm slowly starting to be able to get back to some running. I took a barre class last night. I rode a bike to that barre class. I didn't have any pain.

There are other days when I sit in a strange position on my sofa and go to stand up and there's some pain. Or the soreness is worse than normal after a workout.

It's annoying and I don't like it, but it's not debilitating (or at least not as much as it was over the last six or seven months).

I also realize all this minor relief is likely tied to the cortisone shots I got, which means it's potentially temporary. I've heard some people get the cortisone shots and then they end up not having much if anymore pain years later. Those stories seems pretty anecdotal though, and there's no guarantee that will be what happens for me.

Surgery scares me though -- even arthroscopic surgery, where the incision would be small and the recovery time wouldn't be too terrible. I'd still have to get knocked out, be cut open and fixed up, and then deal with some level of recovery. There's always a chance of complications.

I have two friends who had this surgery last year. They are both pretty fine now, back to their normal activities and both are so glad they had the surgery. That makes me feel a little bit better about things if I do decide to have surgery.

There's also the argument that if this is going to be a life-long thing that it's better to address sooner. I'm young and fairly healthy, which means recovery would likely be easier than if I were to end up having to have this same surgery in like 20 years.

I'm just really conflicted. Surgery seems so drastic right now when things aren't terrible. I'm getting by.

I don't plan to make a decision this minute. I have time to think on it, make a list of a million questions to ask my orthopedic surgeon and see how things progress. Basically this is where I am now: Surgery is scary. I don't want to do it. But at the end of the day, it might end up being the right choice.