While there is no denying that I have saved my family thousands of rands by diagnosing them of various minor ailments, and prescribing the correct medications (no one has died yet, so I must have been right, right?), I have come to realise that I am not quite as good at diagnosing my own ailments. Like many neurotic oncologists, I have diagnosed myself with cancer more times than I can count with both hands. When I was in fifth year Med School, I had cervical cancer. I’ve had a brain tumour at least every six months for the last ten years, bilateral knee cancer (probably osteosarcoma) and lung cancer whenever I go up the stairs. All cured, thank goodness, with hopes and prayers. Didn’t even need any imaging to diagnose.
Jokes aside, this is the danger of specialising – you begin to think that everything is cancer (or the next best thing) if you’re an oncologist. My knees have been killing me for the last few months, and I immediately thought the worst. I couldn’t walk down stairs without pain, and running after my kids just didn’t happen. Of course we live in a double story house and my kids cottoned on to the inability to run pretty quickly, and made the most of it.
Because I’m a bit of a catastrophiser, I assumed my knees were crumbling. I have very flat feet, in common with a great swathe of the population, and I’m convinced that I’ve gone from flat feet to misalignment of my knees and hips, to osteoarthritis of the knees. Which means that the cartilage in my knees had rubbed away and I was but one short step away from a knee replacement or two. Admittedly not quite as bad as cancer in both knees but quite extreme.
Thankfully I thought to ask the super physio, Muhammad Makda at Wits Donald Gordon Medical Centre, to have a look at my knees. The lovely Muhammed earned his stripes as a physioterrorist, and poked and prodded me and shaped me into a pretzel, promptly diagnosing iliotibial band syndrome. Thank the gods! There were screams and terrified laughter emanating from my consulting room, which of course the whole clinic could hear, but I walked out with a massive smile on my face. ITB! Who’da thunk it? I thought only serious athletes got that, not little ol’ me.
I had of course tried to diagnose myself on the internet like the worst kind of patient. What I remember from my orthopaedic block 20 years ago did not serve me well – cancer, traumatic amputations, torn ACL. Sports injuries did not feature much in state practice at that stage. I thought I had a meniscal tear for a while, so I went into denial about that – it would involve an MRI and surgery and I wouldn’t be able to cycle the 947, which I have committed to again this year to raise more money for research.
Now there’s a plan. According to Fit Track, there is a very steep fitness curve to climb, but so far I’m on track.
Can I do it? I flippen’ hope so! Like so many of “my” parents, I don’t have a choice. The economy is in the doldrums and the funding climate is overcast and cloudy, so I have to raise money for research through crowdfunding: click here to help. Here we go again! I did it two years ago so I reckon I can do it again, and this time there’s a team of people to help – I’ll introduce you to them soon.
