Welcome!

Hey folks!  Glad you stopped by.

Let's get this blog started by giving a little background knowledge about myself and my situation:

My name is Derek.  I am 25 years old, happily (and recently) married to my gorgeous high school sweetheart Melissa.  My entire life I have had a passion for sports and being active.  I grew up in a fairly small town in Central Iowa, where I played football, baseball and basketball all through high school (except for qutting basketball after my junior year).  The athlete lifestyle was all I knew.  Every day, every week, there was some sort of practice, game, training, meeting, gathering, etc. for any given sport.

After high school, I struggled to decide where to go for school, and ended up going to the University of Iowa (go hawks!) and hang up the cleats.  Once school started, I knew immediately that something was off. I am the type of person who needs to be part of something bigger than myself and needs to be held accountable, so going to a huge party school, where classes were a 45-minute walk away, did not jive with me.  So I made the second-best decision of my life (first was obviously marrying the woman of my dreams), and I transferred to Central College in Pella, Iowa to play some football again.




Me and the little sis after a Central game


Life was grand until the summer between Sophomore and Junior year, when I was living in Pella, training with the team and Strength staff for the upcoming season.  One day while squatting, I felt some pain the groin/low back area, and immediately stopped.  My back has been an issue since.  I was originally diagnosed with multiple bulging discs, had an epidural cortisone injection, and finished up that season, albeit in some pain.  I decided to give it up after the season, as I felt that I needed about 6 months off from football and heavy lifting to feel better.

Fast forward to Spring of 2013.  My wife and I now live in Omaha, Nebraska, and my back still has issues every once in a while, but the real problem now was my hips (I have read that hip impingement can be diagnosed as back pain for some time).  I had lost a lot of range of motion, and just getting to parallel while squatting was difficult/painful, which was not good for my new athletic endeavor/passion: Crossfit.  Almost every morning when I woke up, my right hip would feel "locked" until I bent my knee 90 degrees, and pushed my leg outward until a loud "pop" would "free up" my leg.  This was when I realized that I needed to get this thing checked out.

After seeing my primary care doc, he referred me to an Orthopedic surgeon.  I had x-rays and an MRI, and the ortho immediately noticed something was off.  He noticed that I had bone spurs on the femur portion of the hip (both hips), and some mild degeneration of the cartilage/soft tissue in the hip socket.  He basically diagnosed Bilateral Femoralacetabular Impingement on the spot, and set me up to have an MR-A, where they inject dye into the hip socket and take pictures, which helps determine if there is labral damage.  After this, I was referred to a hip specialist, Dr. Dietrich, at the University of Nebraska Medical Center.

Dr. Dietrich also comfirmed the diagnosis of FAI and labral damage, so we schedule surgery #1 on my left hip for Wednesday, June 19, 2013.  That is currently 5 days from today.  Yay.

So with that news, I decided to start this blog for 2 reasons:

1. To act as a resource for those people who are thinking about having this surgery, and those that are having the surgery.  You can see what rehab is like, and I will be attempting to keep what (little) strength/endurance I currently have, as well as keeping body fat under control, since my activity level will obviously be quite diminished.  I will also lay out my transition from surgery, back to Crossfitting 100%.

2. To act as a resource for myself.  I am sure rehab and recovery will get frustrating, so it will be nice to have something to look back on to see how far I really have come, and that it is a process, and to stay positive and motivated to get back to my current level of fitness, and exceed it.  I want to be a good Crossfitter...and I will.




Honeymoon - Ambergris Caye, Belize - May 2013


So, what can you expect to see on this blog?  For one, I am planning on being very open in showing/explaining the process and what I do throughout recovery.  I will not sugar-coat anything, hold back, or try to hide how I am feeling.  I will be brutally honest (hopefully without being too obnoxious).  I will show how I am eating, moving, rehabing, living, sleeping, pooping, etc.  Okay, maybe not pooping, but I guarantee the topic of bowel movements will come up at least one time.....or twelve.

With that being said, I am open to any questions, and look forward to sharing my journey from Hip Snaps, back to AMRAPs!

Cheers!

-D