Lindy Kato (Writer)

I have been thinking about my hip. Not really my hip but if I say the word too early, I will be censured again on social media like I was with the picture of ‘bits’ when I blogged about gender ambiguity (https://lindykato.com/2024/12/01/gender-ambiguity/) and had to swap out the ‘bits’ picture for a bunny picture.

The thing is I hurt it wrangling the lawnmower on the 1^st November 2024. I did what most people would do and ignored it thinking it would improve but it didn’t. It got worse. Much worse and I was barely walking. I had the chiropractor manhandle me quite a few times, the last time just to get me to walk onto the plane. If I got off in a wheelchair then so be it. I walked off the plane but then walked too far in Dunedin following the arts trail.

Dunedin was such a surprise for me, the backpackers was great, the sun as well. There were backpackers from Europe the colour of lobsters because they don’t understand the fierceness of the sun under a clear (clean) sky.

Number one son had to massage me on the floor of the museum in Dunedin and magic me into walking again but the next day I had to catch a bus to the Botanic Gardens which I should easily have been able to walk to. When I got there I realised how stupid I was because gardens require walking. Fortunately there was a kiddies train and for a gold coin donation I could be driven around the flat bit and saw at least some of the gardens.

The thing is I hear so many non-runners roll their eyes and tell me it is my fault for all that running. But is it? A trawl of the interweb tells me it is not. One meta-analysis which included 125,810 individuals (Alentorn-Geli et al., 2017) found elite athletes (running for your country level) had a prevalence of 13.3% of hip or knee osteoarthritis and the rate for non-runners was 10.2% so it would seem that yes, running is bad for your joints. BUT, most people I know will fall into the category of recreational runners who have a rate of 3.5%. This looks to me like a significant benefit from running. The authors of this paper acknowledge a ton of confounding problems, age, weight, previous injury etc., and the stats came from English language only studies but there are many more like it.

So, what is going on? It is well known that pounding increases bone density, that’s a good thing, running increases muscle strength in the muscles supporting the joints, also good. What a lot of people don’t perhaps think about is that it increases blood flow to the connective tissue which helps maintain the cartilage and improves joint lubrication. All this has a protective effect against arthritis. Sure you can get injured but almost all of my injuries (I have had plenty) have been from the fact that I am a klutz/idiot, witness the lawnmower wrangling in this instance.

Eventually I bleated about it to my GP and waited for an MRI (initially they had the wrong hip which I noticed at the paperwork stage). On Wednesday, I saw the specialist. He was about to tell me they had attached the wrong scans because he was looking at the hips of a twenty year old and but the birth date on the file indicated a pensioner. Yup, that’s me, perfect hips, no sign of arthritis, no wear and tear and just a minor labral tear which is why it hurts. It will stop hurting.

This isn’t the first time a specialist has had to do a double take. The heart guy said I have the heart of a nineteen year old that hasn’t made much effort. I’m not quite sure how good that is since I have completed an Ironman and used up a fair few heartbeats.  My pulse rate is so low that I can’t wear earplugs to sleep because waiting for the next beat keeps me awake in case it doesn’t come.

My heartbeat is so slow that I couldn’t be sedated for a colonoscopy (so I watched on the big screen and it was great, lovely and pink and clear), or for cataract surgery so I could offer advice while I watched.

I’m thinking about all this because today, Dad is 94 or 95, honestly I have lost track. He doesn’t have hearing aids (he can hear a sweet wrapper at a hundred paces), or glasses and he has all his own teeth. Shame he is not any longer in possession of his marbles but at least he has retained his glass half full personality. I love him and miss him as he is half a world away. I might have genetics in my favour, though I have lost out on some of those leagues as well.

I have been guarding my groin (OK, cat out of the bag it’s a groin injury) but I don’t need to. I won’t make it worse and I need to strengthen my core and get back in the action – I’ve done stuff all for long enough. I need to get back up that ladder and on the roof and do some actual work. If I was going to properly retire from my paid job, I should have done it on Friday because I have to give two months’ notice. I didn’t do it. If I stopped paying the overpriced medical insurance that in a country like New Zealand I don’t really need, I could probably afford to retire.

Makes you think.

Alentorn-Geli, E. et al., (2017) The Association of Recreational and Competitive Running With Hip and Knee Osteoarthritis: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis. Journal of Orthopaedic & Sports Physical Therapy. Volume 47, number 6.