1 Whole Year...

I know I have been majorly slacking on the updates to my blog. Well, that might be a little understatement seeing that my last post was a year and a half ago. Well, I guess the short run down of this last year was...

I finished grad school. At the end of it Scott was telling people he was more excited for me to finish and have his wife back than I was. I did my internship in cardiac rehab during the summer and graduated in August with an MS in heath education/public health. My GPA was the thing I was the proudest of: 4.0, yes that means I was perfect.

I also finished my collegiate running career. It didn't go as well as I had hoped, but I also was injured during all of indoor and outdoor. At the end of the season I was only able to run about 3 miles a day until the pain was too great for me to handle, and I like to think that that is a lot.

So, as I said in the other post I got injured. It started in November with REALLy tight IT bands. I asked my trainer to rub them out and werf (word for he or she) said no. That's an even longer story, but then in December it got worse. I got an MRI in January and was diagnosed with osteoitis pubis. This is softening of the cartilage at the pubic symphasis (where your hip bones come together in the front). I also had a stress fracture on my pubic ramus, but was only told that later. So, they said since it's your last season, you can just run through this and go to physical therapy. I loved my physical therapist but I still continuously got worse and worse. I had another MRI in April with contrast this time. We saw that I might have a labral tear and still had my other issues. At this point the orthopedic surgeon said I don't know what to do with you. I thought it was a sports hernia (athletic pubalgia) and a labral tear. The surgeon said I don't think it is a sports hernia and the only reason I would go in with a scope to your hip is because I think fixing your labrum might make you run differently, but I don't think it is causing you pain. At this point I was mighty frustrated with him (Scott was there and equally frustrated). This surgeon said you can go find a second opinion or have me scope your hip. He didn't give me any idea of someone to see or anything. So, I went online and looked for several hours. I found Dr. Meyers in Philly who does sports hernia repairs. This is a very new field and there aren't many people around who do these repairs. I told UC that I wanted to go to him because I felt as though I had a sports hernia. I did have all the signs and symptoms of one so I have no idea why this surgeon thought I didn't have one. Well, we got me in at the end of June 2010. Had an appointment with him on Monday he said you have a huge tear in your rectus and have ripped the muscle partially off the bone. The next day I had surgery.

So, in the last year as I just explained we also took a trip to philadelphia. We went down on a Thursday night right after Scott was done with work. Got to our hotel in Gettysburg at some a full hour at night. Scott was so tired that he was hallucinating things like umbrellas popping open in the middle of the road. The next day we went and bought an audio tour of Gettysburg and drove around and listened. It was awesome. I did this with my family when I was younger, but it meant a lot more to me now. We went on a couple of tours at the sites and ran into this really funny tour guide that thought it was pretty cool that we were LDS. So, after that humbling and awe-inspiring tour we went to hershey, PA. This was a lot less awesome than Gettysburg, but I guess what do you expect! It was still fun and we (Scott) got free chocolate out of it. Afterward, we drove into philly, which was crazy. I have to say that looking for parking was crazy. We finally gave up trying to find a cheap place to park and parked at our hotel (the hilton in downtown, $50, I love priceline) for $31/day. We then walked to Penn's landing and went to a thing called taste of Philly. A whole bunch of Philladelphia restaurants had booths that you can buy little servings of their food. We got some philly cheese steak and some other food that I don't even remember now. For dessert we ate some gelato that wasn't amazing. Saturday we woke up and went to Valley Forge and did a cell phone tour around that area. There were also some fun story tellers at the different stops along the way. Our history is just so fascinating and amazing. After we were done there we went back to the hotel and went to the Ben franklin museum. We watched Iron Man 3 in Imax. Then went to Walmart to buy food for the next day (Sunday). We went to church which in itself was a whole process! We have a GPS (Sam) and he kept taking us on streets that were shut off because of a bike race. I don't know why but Scott and I couldn't stop laughing about it. We got to church about 30 minutes late, but we tried right? The talks were very interesting. I felt like I had entered in a revival. 90% of the congregation was African. I absolutely loved the last women who spoke. I don't remember what she spoke about I just remember the spirit as she spoke, and the love and passion she had for the gospel. I don't think that us white americans are very good at that. Relief society was very interesting. It was a talk about good, better, best but I felt like I was in primary. We microwaved our lunch in the kitchen there and left to go to Longwood Gardens. These are gardens right outside Philly that a guy made and designed himself. It was breathtaking and amazing. I highly recommend this to anyone. There were lots of fountain shows and what not. We then went back to the hotel to plan the next day. We went to the visitor's center and got tickets to independence hall. We watched a movie on it and then went to the liberty bell. That was supper cool. That huge crack in the liberty bell, was actually not the fatal crack. The fatal crack was so small and tiny that you could bairly see it. There's a good anallogy in there somewhere, I just don't feel like drawing it out. The liberty bell that was sent over actually is not the same one that we have now. They had to recast it and people were saying it might not even be the same metal. We then had to go get an MRI on my hip (that was why we took the trip). After, we went to our independence hall tour. That was amazing as well. We go to see where the founding fathers decided to declare independence. They also had some of the founding fathers things out on the tables and chairs. We had to leave the tour right before they were ending to run up to the appointment with Dr. Meyers. We literally ran several blocks to get there. I was SO sweaty during the examination, I was so embarrassed. We were told about having to get surgery the next day. We got philly cheesesteaks and auntie anne's pretzels that afternoon. That night we had room service (first time for both of us). The next morning I had the surgery. All I really remember about it is waiting in the preop room for an hour. I talked to all the people in the beds next to me, read my doctor's notes. Finally I went it and as they were telling me to climb onto the operating table I put my head in the pillow and said, wow this is a very comfy pillow. They told me I could keep it and call it my 35,000 dollar pillow. I also remember coming out of anesthesia and shaking uncontrollably. People kept asking how I was doing and I kept saying fine how are you doing. I remembered that my anesthesiologist didn't get lunch before the surgery so I kept asking him if he had lunch. I also kept complementing the nurses on their hair and shoes. All I wanted when I woke up was water and my husband. I kept setting off the alarms on my monitor because my HR dropped below 40. I got into my own room afterward and they told me to order some food. I watched TV and waited for my food and husband. They kept me there a little longer because of my reaction to the anesthesia. Scott finally came and next I'll explain what was keeping him. He went back out and got me some auntie anne's pretzels. We left the hospital and went by a philly cheesesteak place. There was no parking so, yes, probably 5 hours after my surgery I stood in line for a philly cheese steak. The next day we got up and walked around valley forge, where we stayed the last night, and then drove home with several walking breaks.

Another this that happened that I hinted at was that we sold our house in provo!!! We were praying for this for a long time, and the Lord has a funny sense of humor sometimes when answering our prayers. A couple minutes after Scott said goodbye to me as I was wheeled into the preop room, our real estate agent called him and said I need you to print, signed and get these document notarized and sent back to me now. Scott said, my wife just went into surgery, can't we wait until later or tomorrow. The agent said no. So, luckily the nurses there were very nice and let him use the computer and print things out, found him a notary in the hospital and a fedex building close by. So, that is what Scott was doing while I was in surgery, and why I had to wait to see my husband after surgery.

We had thanksgiving at our place here in Cincinnati again. That was SO fun to have all my family here in our little apartment. We didn't do a salt encrused turkey this time but we brined it. While my family was here we went to the Zoo and aquarium. We also did the turkey trot here in Cincinnati.

We went to Boise at the beginning of December to see Scott's family up there. That was so much fun to see all the adults but mostly the little ones that had grown SO much! It had been 9 months since we had been to Idaho.

Scott and I went to Texas that year for Chirstmas. It had been something like 2 1/2 years or more since we had been to Texas. While we were there we went to the Space center in Houston where they do all the astronaut training.

This whole time I have been looking for a job to no avail. That is still where my employment status is right now.

Scott has earned two raises and one promotion since he has started his job. They seem to really like him there and he likes it as well.

The most recent saga of our life is our SECOND trip to philadelphia. Yes. The saga will forever continue it seems. I have spent too much time on this update and I'm sure that no one will read the whole thing so, I don't want to bore anyone more.