My hips don't lie.

On several accounts, my hips don't lie. For one thing, they are the hips of a woman with kids. For two, they tell on me, after every holiday eating and drinking binge, every time I stop exercising for a few years months. And for three, they remind me, I'm getting old(er).

What the bleep am I talking about, you ask?

Oh, you're not asking? Okay, really I don't blame you. Go watch this instead. It's far more entertaining.

Something is up with my left hip. I noticed it months ago and blamed it on the cold weather. Because can't almost everything can be blamed on winter? I would groan as I rose out of a chair and J would ask "what's the matter with you?" and I'd reply "ooooh it's my hip!" and clutch my thigh like an eighty four year old woman post-hip-surgery. And then, in typical style, I ignored it for as long as possible, until my doctor talked about joint pain during a physical exam and I was forced to acknowledge it. 

Given that I work in healthcare and spend half my job talking to patients about joint and muscle pain, it's plain baffling, how resistant I am to acknowledging my own ailments. I even know the rehabilitation exercises that could be helping me with this. Have I done even a single one of them? Not even a little.

I suppose I'm of the opinion that when it comes to the body, with a little care and rest, most things will resolve themselves (if only that worked with teeth).

Or maybe, I'm just too busy / reluctant / stubborn, to address my own complaints.

I seem to think I'm made of steel.

Unfortunately, I'm not. Yesterday I was lying on the floor on my side, fishing a Hot Wheels car out from under the sofa with a kitchen spatula, and felt a searing pain rush down my thigh. I sprang up and yelled. My son looked at me and asked what was wrong.

"Oh nothing, sweetie." I replied. And then "Mummy is just getting old and will probably need a hip replacement."

My son looked back at me sincerely, and at that moment I crossed my fingers that he wouldn't repeat what I'd told him - "My Mummy is getting a new hip!" - the next time I was picking him up from school, or at the grocery store.

I blame Shakira and all that dancing around the kitchen while I was supposed to be cooking.