There are a lot of different way to mess up your meniscus. There are different types of tears, different locations (which relate to both the mechanics of the knee and blood flow/reparability), different previously-extant conditions (arthritis, etc).
My story.. the general parts "may" be worth considering in your case. I had some problems with my left knee a few years back, it got to where I couldn't bend it all the way up and had to lay on the bed to put on my pants. I couldn't get down on the ground to do yard work, just got close and then flopped all the way down. It was swollen and I had some pain as well. I tried resting it for a couple months, then went to an orthopedic sports medicine guy. I had a meniscus tear that had created a cyst of "knee goo" behind the knee that was limiting my motion. He recommended surgery, which I scheduled as quickly as possible. Like the OP, I wanted to get "back in action".
I don't use my health insurance or see doctors much, so I did some (more) research on the knee issue as well as all the possible pitfalls of "network/non-network" providers and some of the (very expensive) things that can go haywire in the insurance/billing area. Bottom line is after hours of phone calls, nobody could tell me for sure if they were or were not in network and I often got different answers from the insurance company and the providers (4 providers were surgery center, ortho surgeon, nurse anesthetist, and anesthetist).
I knew that once they stuck the first needle in my arm, I'd lose all control over this and they couldn't even provide answers to simple questions, so I cancelled the surgery. It was a hassle at the time, but worked out well.
A few weeks later, I went to a different ortho surgeon who gave a different opinion on what type of surgery to do, in his opinion the original procedure would not have worked. (Both docs worked on professional sports teams as well). I decided to wait awhile longer.
It's been a few years and I am no longer aware of any discomfort or limitation on that knee. There was a study done (in Europe I believe) where they did either meniscotomy surgery or mock surgery on people with meniscus tears. Results showed that a lot of times, you'll recover on your own, and if not-- you can still get the surgery. Not so the other way around, that chunk of your body was put in the Bio-Waste trash bin at the hospital and it's gone forever.
SO-- I recently started having problems with the OTHER knee. I'm still ambulatory and can work around it, so I'm going to watch and wait.
HTH and remember...YMMV
) about surgery vs wait and see. I've been feeling this pain for quite a while now, and while it's better than it was, it's still not good. I've been taking an anti-inflamitory twice a day as prescribed, and icing it, and wearing a knee brace, and resting it as much as possible, but I'm going stir crazy. I have so much to do here on the property that I can't leave my hubby to do by himself...I need to be up and working (grrr!!) But at least this is the "down time" of the year - lucky for me it's not mowing season!
