The news i received on Nov 26th (6A)

During my softball practices here at southern Connecticut I have been having extremely bad leg pain. On November 26^th I went to my doctor who did my knee surgery this summer to have him look at my leg. I got an MRI on both of my knees and shins. He also did tests on me and told me that I am starting to get stress fractures in my shins. I was upset about that because I knew playing the rest of my season I would be in pain. As he was doing more tests on my legs he unfortunately told me that I have Compartment Syndrome.

Compartment syndrome is a limb and life-threatening condition which occurs after an injury, when there is not a sufficient amount of blood to supply the muscles and nerves with oxygen and nutrients because of the raised pressure within the compartment such as the arm, leg or any enclosed space within the body and leads to nerve damage because of the lack of blood supply. The severity of compartment syndrome can be divided into acute, subacute, and chronic compartment syndrome. I am not going to loose my legs or my life, I am at the first stage of compartment syndrome which is acute. The doctor prescribed me to 6 weeks of physical therapy and then a cortisone shot in 6 weeks. I have still been participating in softball. As the week went on I started to loose feeling in my legs and get the worst pain to the point where I can’t even walk on them. There are times that my legs will give out and I will loose complete feeling in them and it feels like I am paralyzed in my legs.

I have talked to the athletic trainer for the softball team along with my exercise science teacher and the volleyball athletic trainer. All three now believe that it is getting worse and I have subacute stage, they all suggest that I get surgery as soon as possible. My uncle is a surgeon in Hartford so I have an appointment to see him on October 14^th to talk about surgery. I have talked to both him and my surgeon from home on the phone and they both believe that I need surgery. The surgery that I will need is called a fasciotomy.

A fasciotomy is a surgical procedure where the fascia is cut to relieve tension or pressure commonly to treat the resulting loss of circulation to an area of tissue or muscle. The surgery has a very high success rate but the recovery process is 4 months and I would need to be on surgery for 10 days after the surgery.

The difficult task that I face is I don’t know when the perfect time to get the surgery is. I also do not want to get the surgery because I do not want to be injured for my first season as a college athlete and miss out on an experience that I have waited forever since I was a little girl. I felt horrible when I found out this news. I was even more upset by the fact that every time I try and play a sport at my full capacity I get seriously injured. It makes me think if I will have to stop doing something I love for good. If I want to get better I just have to take care of myself better and attend physical therapy everyday to get back on the field as soon as possible.