Diary of a knee injury

Following my slight incident on the one and only skiing holiday I have every winter, I thought I'd do a little progress report as and when things happen. It's somewhere for me to document my progress as well as keep people informed, should they be interested.

For those that aren't familiar with my story, I had the tiniest fall when I was getting off a chair lift recently, I was trying to avoid someone that had fallen over in front of me, I went to ski round them and my legs gave way sending my knees places they shouldn't really go. At the time of the accident I felt the ligaments tearing in both my knees, however the left one came out worse off and I ended up being dragged off the mountain in the blood wagon and wheeled into the medical centre in the village.

The initial prognosis was that I had over stretched the medial ligament in my left knee; I was strapped up and sent on my way with a 250 euro bill and some crutches, with strict instructions not to ski for the rest of my holiday. It was Tuesday.

On returning to the UK I saw my own doctor who wrote a letter to the physio at the local hospital and sent me up to A&E to 'get me in the system'.

I saw the physio who didn't actually do any physio on me; she just bent my legs into strange places hurting me in the process, told me that I had in fact torn the ligament and possibly also damaged the cartilage as well.

I was referred to the knee specialist who I saw today, I am now the proud owner of a hideous leg brace (rather than a nice little knee brace) that means I can't bend my knee at all, I have to have an MRI scan and possible surgery depending on the outcome of the MRI.

So things may get worse before they get better, but I can still ski next year as long as I do everything to the book and don't do anything silly, I could be back on my own two feet in 6-8 if no surgery required otherwise it could be a bit longer.

Watch this space :-)

OMG I'm real sorry to hear that what bad luck, I ripped my cruicate ligament on the second day of my 1st learn to ski holiday,its pants had to have it operated on and loads of physio but I did go skiing again 9 months later,

Good luck with MRI! It sucks being injured. I just spent a month in a full-length knee brace and on crutches after dislocating patella. Will try to ski next weekend for the first time since January.

Can't say I know what you're going through, but my daughter had the same injury when some moron skied into her on the last run on the last day some years back. She was determined to get fit and play hockey and ski again, and suffered a few setbacks on the way but she skied again the year after. Little thanks to the NHS for their alleged physio, which was nothing short of useless but if you take advice on board about what to do and get on with it yourself at home and at your local gym, you'll get there.

Best of luck nellster xx

I am sorry Nelly, to hear that it's worse than you first thought :(

Best of luck that all goes according to plan and you're ski-ing again next year :D

Gotta say did mine whilst skiing in jan stood up off a lift and my knee locked. Luckily second to last day so straight to my doc when I got home and off to private one, couldn't find anything on the MRI even though it was in a locked position but after an arthroscopy they took a huge chunk of summit out. 2 weeks on and physio twice I went to the gym last night and took it easy knee aches a bit today but who knows I might get a week at the end of April depending on the snow coverage. Good luck don't loose faith and keep us up to date

Shame about your hols Nelly, however the long term recovery should be fine.
If you've ripped it big time it might need repairing however most medical ligament tears are partial and just need time and a bit of physio to get back to normal. Either way next year should be fine.
Certainly not as bad an injury as a ruptured cruciate which tends to take you out of a season if all goes well.

Got to say I saw more people fall at chair lifts this year in one week than in the previous 8. Just amazed at the number of half wits who can't comprehend that you can't turn the moment you get off a 6 man chair lift. My wife was taken down by a gormless kid who turned right & went across the back of 3 sets of skis. It was the first time in 25 years of marriage I've seen her do the splits.
She was fine and it was nice to see the youth's mother administer a bollocking to her offspring after checking Claire was OK.

If there was no loud pop then hopefully you are okay. Is it painful? Apparently with knees more pain is a good sign?

When I ruptured ACL there was a big noise followed by real pain for about 30 seconds and then nothing. Just a sense of thinking am not going to run this off.