Conquering Jimmy Bob

"Guys! You'll never guess what just happened!" I exclaimed, as tears of joy streamed down my cheeks."
"What!" my class replied. "Tell us Ellie, what exactly are you so excited about?"
"Well... here it goes... I'M HAVING SURGERY! Isn't that great people?! I'm having surgery!"
Thirty-five jaws dropped before my eyes. To tell you the truth I wasn't so surprised. Why should my friends be happy that I'm having surgery? Why should I even be happy that I'm having surgery?

It was the day before orientation. Sitting in the car for eight hours on my way home from New York. Boy, the summer was great... BUT SCHOOL! Ugh! I hate school! I had a lot to look forward though: there was Convention, and it was my senior year. Yup, this year should be a good one!

The year started out nicely. I was reunited with my old classmates, whom I haven't seen in two months, and I was acquainted with the new girls. Everything was going pretty well.

About one month into the school year I started feeling funny pains in my right ankle. It was almost as if something inside my foot was on fire. For a while I didn't tell anyone was going on. As most people know, I am pretty accident prone (unfortunately) and I know what a broken and sprained ankle feels like, and this was nothing of the sort. I thought that since I don't have much luck concerning my ankle, it wasn't a big deal, and the pain would subside... but it didn't. Every day was worst than the next. It was especially painful at night for some odd reason, and it was so excruciating that I wouldn't sleep at night anymore - literally. I would pull all - nighters at least three times a week. Because of all the commotion I was missing a lot of school, due to the fact that I was always in pain and always tired - and I mean always.

At this point my parents knew about my situation, so they took me to an orthopedist. From the start I knew this appointment was not going to be a good one. I tried to explain to him to the best of my ability the kind of pain I had. He claimed it was a simple sprain, and I should wear a brace, and the pain should subside in a week. I knew this couldn't be possible because my foot had been hurting for two months, and I already wear a brace. Something just didn't make sense. I argued with him that my pain was very peculiar and I was sure that it was not a sprained ankle. Despite my disagreement, he carefully wrapped my foot in an ace bandage and told me to have a nice day.

After many confrontations and arguments, my parents decided to take me to my rheumatologist. (I have juvenile rheumatoid arthritis, so my family thought this may be connected). After many hmms, and twists of the ankle she suggested that it may be a hairline fracture, and despite an x-ray, it just wouldn't show up, and I would need an MRI. At this point I was willing to try anything, even though I suffer tremendously from claustrophobia. Yom tov was coming along, and there was no appointments open until after the holidays. Instead, I had a long and painful Succos.

The day of my long awaited MRI finally arrived. Luckily I was only in from the waist down. After an hour and a half they discovered.... ABSOLUTELY NOTHING! The radiologist and the orthopedist didn't see anything, although there was a little inflammation around the bone and it looked as if my last break never healed properly.

This is not right, not right at all. Something smells in the state of Denmark.

Approximately two weeks later I had an appointment to get a cast on my leg. Only hours before my appointment I got a call from my rheumatologist.
"I know what it is! It's called an osteoid osteoma!"
A what? A who? An osteowhachamacallit???
"An osteoid osteoma is a benign tumor," my doctor explained. "It lives in the bone, and at night it secretes pain chemicals into the bloodstream. That is probably why you're in so much pain during the night - that's when it grows Although it's rare, especially in the ankle, it may be very possible that you have one. It's very hard to spot. You can't see it in an x-ray, and you can't see it in an MRI. The only way to tell is with a CT scan." And on that note my doctor she made me an appointment for a CT scan, literally fifteen minutes before my other appointment in the same hospital.

I lied down on the cool table as it slid in funny positions. I really didn't care what was wrong with my ankle anymore, I just wanted the pain to disappear! A few minutes later the radiologist and the orthopedist (the same orthopedist that was about to cast my leg) came to share the results and low and behold I had an osteoid osteoma that was about six millimeters long living in my foot. Strangely, I was really excited.

One week later I was scheduled for a radio ablation surgery, in which laparoscopecally, they would burn out the tumor. That week was the longest week of my life! The morning of my surgery I actually went to school to get some moral support from my friends, but instead they all just said how crazy I was.

For those of you who had surgery know how it feels to wake up from anesthesia. You're confused, and nauseous, and going through a lot of withdrawal. I felt as if I had been in the O.R. for seconds when in fact the surgery took three hours. According to my mother, they turned the C.T. scan into an operating table, and did the whole thing through the C.T. It was actually very intersting. There were eight doctors, and about a billion nurses observing the surgery. I made it to the books! Nothing like this has every really happened before, and everyone wanted to catch a glimpse of it.

I recovered pretty quick from the operation. The surgery was on Wednesday and I was back in school on Monday (on crutches). And since it was done laparoscopically, I only had two tiny scars the size of splinters. I guess I really didn't have much time to recover, or to even think about my ankle. With Convention coming along, and being motzei shabbos performance head... WHEW! I was crazy busy!

Convention was amazing, but all the fun was coming to a fade, and classes were returning back to normal. During this time my ankle was still very weak, and I was still in pain, but the pain was surgical pain. About one month later a funny feeling crept up into my foot, and not a good funny. I laid low because this was a really serious matter. I started missing a lot of school again, and when things started getting real suspicious I told my mother what was going on.

My mother called my doctor (the rheumatologist - not the orthopedist!) for some possible feedback. She suggested that either it grew back (the tumors can grow back, but usually not in that short span of time, and it's really rare) or the surgeon didn't get the whole tumor. The second choice seemed more of a possibility. Before I knew it, I had another MRI and another CT scan, and you know what showed up this time? ABSOLUTELY NOTHING! All the radiologist saw was a lot of bone edema, which was normal in my case.

I was so mad! Why couldn't anyone figure out what was wrong with me? For crying out loud - I'M ONLY SEVENTEEN - NOT SEVENTY! I became very depressed and I was missing so much school that there was a question whether I would graduate or not. My reumatologist did everything she could to ease the pain. She prescribed me medication that was aspirin based. Aspirin will dissolve an osteoid osteoma, if there was any sign of one. The only problem is that I'm allergic to a lot of foods, and medications. It happened to be that my mother was allergic to aspirin, and with my luck, the odds just weren't so good. In the end, I was told to take the medicine with benadryl - which didn't work anyways. Now even if I was going to school, I was falling asleep in class. I literally tried every possible medication. From Advil to steroids - nothing worked.

My mother was so good and persistent, and she finally got an appointment with the top orthopedist in the hospital. I was so excited! I pranced into the doctor's office with complete faith.
"Well, the only way we can see what's going on in there is to take a peak." I almost gave the doctor a hug! I was just so happy that someone was going to do something. "The only problem is that I'm booked for a while, I have surgery's scheduled for the next couple of weeks, so your surgery wouldn't take place for at least another month." I burst into tears. I was ready to get down on my hands on knees and beg.
"Please, doctor!" My mother cried, she too felt my pain. "It's her senior year and she already missed so much school, you have to do the surgery NOW!" The doctor felt bad but there was nothing he could really do. He offered to check his schedule, to double check if there were any openings, but it didn't look so good. I tell you, G-d was watching over me because he came back saying that someone had just cancelled and there was an opening that week.

To put it in "short" words, he made an inch incision in my foot and found out that the radio ablation had burned the bone, and there was a chunk of dead bone in my foot without any circulation. Sorry if this grosses anyone out, but the only thing that made sense to do was remove that part of bone. But don't worry, it will grow back!

As I sit here writing this blog, I think back on the heck I went through. It has been three months since my last surgery, and Baruch Hashem I feel like a new person. I will B'Ezras Hashem attend my graduation in June (with an official diploma!) and attend Seminary in Israel next year. I thank all of you, my friends and family who helped me through the whole thing. In hard times it's really good to hear that you care. Sometimes the best thing you can do is to just be there and hold a hand without saying anything at all.

I can finally say after all this time... R.I.P. JIMMY BOB!