The Waiting Game

I haven’t been writing much, as right now there isn’t much to share – it’s a waiting game.  We have the diagnosis but the orthopedic surgeon (see the prior post) wants to wait 6 weeks for the inflammation of her tendons and bone bruising to calm down before making the surgery decision.  But that’s 6 weeks from when we went to the specialist.  For E, it’s an eternity of doing absolutely nothing. No dancing, no pilates, no weight bearing (like that will happen), nothing but putting her foot in a “boot” and waiting.  Since she’s been dealing with ankle pain for months, this seems unbearable to her. Imagine dealing with pain, limitations, etc.  Imagine being told at first it’s just minor (tendonitis), and you have to just deal with it . Then imagine being told it’s due to overuse (ankle sprain) and going to physical therapy and taping daily.  And then months later (after mom insisting on more testing) it ends up being a bigger/different issue than everyone thought and treated you for.  And we wait, and we wait and we wait.

We aren’t complaining about the orthopedic surgeon, nor the general orthopedic doctor, nor the physical therapist nor the general practitioner – but to tell a 16 year old that she can’t dance, she shouldn’t put and weight on her foot for 6 weeks and just wait, that doesn’t sit well for us both.  School is about to start, and her last few weeks of summer fun that was supposed to be with friends and sun have turned into rest, doctor appointments and pain.

She and I are full of questions.  If and when surgery happens, how long until she can dance? E is supposed to start teaching classes at her home studio again in 2 week, but can she? Does this put a damper on her post-high school ballet thoughts?  Only time will tell.

And we wait.