Losing My Leg Isn't An Appealing Thought...

...Funnily enough.

A couple of weeks ago I knocked my left knee, maybe on a gloriously well-placed piece of equipment at the gym. I'm not sure.

On that very spot a rich, dark bruise developed. No big deal. Even though I am generally someone who does not bruise. People have survived bruises for millennia. We're tough like that.

And it faded. As they do. Then, on Sunday, I noticed another development. A few inches below the initial bruise, another bruise appeared. It was very red, and over the following days turned many wonderous shades of pink, yellow, blue...gradually growing, in a circular formation, wider and wider. A red area has remained at the centre of this mysterious bruise. It has a little heat to it, has a tight, uncomfortable pain and is noticeably swollen. There is also a large lump underneath, palpable and tender to the touch.

I had been putting off going to my GP. I mean, a nurse, going to see a doctor because he has a bruise...I've never been quite that precious.

But, being a nurse, I know bruises can be more than an innocuous discolouration of skin. A lot more. Add that to the devastatingly sad fact that my partner's friend died a few years ago after developing leukemia. He had found out by finding a bruise on his leg.

Balancing a little knowledge with trying to not catastrophise "a bruise" isn't easy. I was torn between ignoring it, and thinking about what my advice would be to anyone else in a similar position. I would always tell someone to go and see their doctor. Always.

So, with the bruise still spreading, and the pain not easing, I decided to see the GP yesterday evening.

A friend had suggested it could be fat necrosis, and the GP wouldn't deny it but didn't want to leap to that conclusion just yet. She asked me to not go to work, knowing I spend most of the working day on my feet. She said that being on my feet could interfere with healing and could even make it worse. She felt that there was infection at the site, possibly the beginnings of cellulitis. It was a little scary when she suggested it could get worse and if it did I was to go straight to the Emergency Department, as it may need IV antibiotics.

All from a bruise!

After drawing some circles around the bruise and then the central red area, making my leg look like an archery target, and telling me to stay off my feet, she prescribed some oral antibiotics.

This morning my leg isn't any better, but it isn't any worse. I am to go back to the GP in a couple of days for another assessment.

I don't think I'll lose my leg or anything as extreme as that, but it does make me think how much we take our health for granted.  It can take something as silly as a bruise or a lump to change everything.