Monthly Archives: February 2011

My week has gotten unexpectedly busy, thanks to the addition of physical therapy at Physical Therapy and Sports Assessment Center to my schedule. I went for the first time yesterday, am going again today, and am scheduled for three appointments next week. I’ll get into my quad-strengthening, knee-protecting exercise lineup later, but for now, I offer the top five reasons I knew I’d picked the right place.

1. The waiting room is full of thank-you notes from professional tennis players, ice skaters and other athletes PTSAC founder Edward Lee has helped overcome injuries. One is from a hang-glider whose note starts this way: “After hang-gliding into a volcano …” Makes my ACL tear, caused by a wayward snowboarder, seem tame by comparison.

2. Everyone who works in the Silver Spring office seems friendly and knowledgeable, from the gym manager who happens to be a former elite running coach from Guyana to the office manager, a kind, older gentleman who checked up on my when I was doing leg lifts, and offered me water at every turn.

3. Everyone was optimistic and encouraging. When rehabbing my wrist, the therapy tech with whom I had most of my appointments made me cry on a regular basis with his pessimism and total lack of bedside manner. Everyone I talked to yesterday made me feel like a rehab rock star, pointing out everything working in my favor: I was super-active before the injury; I can already straighten my leg all the way less than a week after ACL reconstruction surgery; I can bend it pretty far; and I’m totally committed to therapy.”You’re going to make me look good,” Lee said as he watched me bend and extend my leg on the bike.

4. I got to do a real workout. From hamstring curls to squats on the wobble board, I got to really move my legs. Lee watched and tweaked my exercise lineup as I went, adding more weight here, switching me to single-leg from double there.

5. Ed Lee himself. He played two games in the NFL in 1982 before an ACL tear ended his career. Not his season—his career. So to say that he understands how devastating such an injury can be is an understatement. But while he lost his dream career, he found a new one: Lee got into physical therapy after going through rehab for his own injury. In a story about Brene Moseley, a local high-school basketball phenom who sought Lee’s help for her own ACL tear, Lee told the Gazette:

“I can understand the fear and initial shock she had. An ACL was a death sentence in the 1980s when I got it. Now, surgery has greatly improved and you can come back stronger, and she will be. (But) it won’t be until her freshman year in college when she’s fully recovered mentally.”

Let’s just pretend he’s talking about me, shall we? The take-aways: It’s OK if I’m still bummed and shaken up. And I *will* come back stronger.

I have so much good news to report!

I saw Dr. P. for the first time since my ACL reconstruction surgery last week, and was cleared to swim, bike, row, lift and limp around on my new ACL without a brace. More importantly, he told me the surgery was a huge success, and that my menisci—which he previously thought may have been torn—were “baby’s bottom pristine” upon closer inspection.

I was also cleared to start physical therapy, which longtime readers will know is a hugely exciting proposition for me, as I’m a total physical therapy geek.

Sadly, Beefcake Brad, who helped me work through some nagging hip and ankle injuries a year ago, is no longer practicing in the area, so I had to seek help elsewhere. I asked Dr. P., asked around among runner-friends, scoured the “Best of” lists in places like the Washingtonian and Bethesda Magazine, Googled the heck out of the results I found, figured out which therapists would work with TRICARE … and found the perfect match.

Edward P. Lee of the Physical Therapy and Sports Assessment Center is a former Detroit Lions wide receiver who got into PT after tearing his own ACL. He just happens to practice two blocks away from my apartment.

There’s always a brief period of awkwardness when you and the therapist are feeling each other out to gauge each other’s commitment and motivation. They’re looking to see how serious you are about your treatment. You’re looking to see if they understand just how important it is that you are able to resume playing your recreational sport of choice as soon as humanly possible. Hopefully, these guys will realize quickly that, once they earn my trust, I will be their most dedicated (if most annoying) patient, more likely to overdo my at-home exercises than to skip them.

Stay tuned for my new PT lineup, which I promise to share here.