I made it!

I made it to the city on my bike! I am beyond happy...I haven't yet written about my new discovered ailment. I recently found out (with a lot of physical and emotional pain) that I have arthritis in my right hip, apparently a really bad case of it, according to the doctor. I haven't yet put my feelings down in paper, I suppose I am still trying to come to terms with it. I know I should be happy that the pain was arthritis and not the "c" word, which I must admit crossed my mind, but it is still a very hard thing to have to endure from a young (relatively) age. So I cried a lot when I found out, a lot. I parked my car outside work after visiting the doctor and cry for 20 minutes before I gathered the courage to walk to my room and face my friends...it didn't really mattered that I had composed myself because I broke down again when I told them...I don't want to have the operation (hip replacement) I really don't... call it fear, call it pride, call it a need to be whole...I don't know what it is and I know that is not the end of the world, but it is the end of a lot of things. Things that I would like to be doing, that I might have plan to do in the near future, or simply the end of "me without arthritis". I don't mean to sound catastrophic or pesimistic, in fact, I do feel optimistic that if I put the effort that I need to put in I may be able to still do all those things that I planned in some corner of my mind. Today it feels like the beginning of it. I have been put on this medication (an anti-inflamatory) that seems to have been working. I haven't had bad pain in the last 3 nights and the days are also better, so I am quite cheerful. Today I drove with my bike in the back of the car to the end of Riversdale Road and the beginning of Swan street and parked my car. I met Ric and Anton and I rode the rest of the way to Southbank. It wasn't much, but it certainly was a lot more than I thought I would be able to do 2 weeks ago when I wasn't able to stay sitted for more than 15 minutes without feeling pain. So it is a great day today and I feel like celebrating.