Hi, this is Jeff Teolis, you're listening to Pinball Profile. you know where we are, you know what we do. I thought I would share to the thousands and thousands of people that listen on a regular basis, share something that I'm going through. If you're faint of heart, I wouldn't recommend listening to this as we're going to get into some details of a medical condition that is going to make some people squeamish at the very least. I don't know how many people that play pinball are in the medical profession. I certainly know Dr. John in Australia. So I will try to put these terms, these conditions, these experiences that I'm going through in a layman's terms so that we all can kind of understand what's happened to your favorite podcaster. I think the four words to best describe it are lucky to be alive. You may wonder what I'm talking about. You might have saw me at Pinburg. Wait a minute, he looked fine. Or was he just bearing the pain that has been ongoing for weeks and weeks? Maybe the latter. Maybe so. Let's go back six weeks. When I was coaching my son in baseball, as you do with 16 to 18-year-olds, sometimes you have to warm up a pitcher. These kids are throwing curveballs, fastballs, and I'm an older. man, certainly not in the shape of these young kids, but you know what? I've obviously played a lot of baseball. I'll go and catch these kids. And you know some of the balls don exactly hit the glove They might hit the dirt and you have to make some quick reactions In the heat of the moment you don notice the pain right You just when you in competition you just you grin and you bear it Little had I known that during this course of action of warming up a pitcher in the crouched position, knee hyperextended, there might have been some damage done. Well, after four or five, six weeks, enough is enough. I can't take the pain anymore. So I call the doctor to get a checkup on this. Said a few Hail Marys. Said, Doc, give me the news. You know, it has to be tough for when a doctor delivers some horrible news. I can only imagine. But it makes it tougher when you actually see the doctor start to cry. to deliver the news. Well, I said, Doc, I'm a big boy. I can take it. Give it to me. Are we talking months, weeks? He shook his head. I'm like, minutes, seconds? He said, Jeff, I'm going to throw some words at you, and I don't want to scare you. Well, I took a deep breath, sucked up my courage, and said, Doc, give it to me. Well, after some of the tests we've run, it looks like we're looking at a meniscus tear and possible patella femoral syndrome. PFS, they call it in the business, apparently. I said, why? Why, God? Why me? And I thought, you know, why not me? He said, no, you know, we're going to try something. And I said, whoa, whoa, whoa, I don't want any kind of voodoo or black magic stuff. No, no, no, no. Just, what are you talking about, Doc? And he said, it's been done in some other countries. There's some reports of some successes. And I said Doc I got nothing to lose What are we talking here He said it called physiotherapy I said slow down slow down What are you talking about? He said, they're going to try a few maneuvers. You're going to do it a few times each week. And maybe, I mean, it might be a miracle, but maybe there'll be a way to save the knee and more importantly, your life. And I said, you know what, Doc? I'm a married man. My wife needs me. My kids need me. I have two pets. There's still a mortgage on the house. I've got some stuff in the garage I got to clean up. Whatever it takes, I'll roll the dice. I've got nothing to lose, obviously. I mean, this is probably one of the worst things you've ever seen. He said something about a waste of time or something. I couldn't really understand him but the point is I'm gonna fight on and pinball profile is going to continue I'm still gonna do the things I set out to do promote pinball talk to as many different people as I can find out what it's like all across the world and most importantly keep picking on Josh Sharpe you know when you look back and you see the poor performance at Pinberg in some recent tournaments Maybe now you start to put it together and go, ah, that's probably it. He was in a lot of pain, and how could you possibly concentrate on pinball? I'm sure some of the people that I played in the TTI at ReplayFX are now embarrassed of the relentless attacks they chose to direct at me when all I was just trying to do was play pinball for some friends and fans. and to raise some money for the charity. Don't beat yourself up over the abuse you caused. I've got big shoulders, but I don't want your charity. I try to hide my face when I grimace because so many eyes are on me People catch it and say what wrong Jeff Oh nothing nothing I be okay But now the truth is out I understand that people are going to want to watch the progress of this possible recovery There's going to be medical case studies likely. Probably a Netflix documentary. I'm sure Dr. Pin himself is calling me up right now. If not rushing in the car to come over and check up on me. But it's not like me to want the fanfare, so just let me fight through this. Please respect my and my family's privacy during this time, and I'll report to you as we progress. So I want to thank you for the prayers, the cards, the letters, the emails to pinballprofile at gmail.com. You people are an inspiration to me to keep going on, keep up the fight. There are some words being thrown around about me. People are saying a miracle, hero, warrior, hypochondriac. I know what most of these words mean, and yeah, I think you're right. So it's time to suck it up, buttercup, and keep on keeping on. I thank you for listening. I apologize for the tears that have been shed, but I feel your concern and care, and I will fight on. I will continue this crusade and I thank you you can find our group on Facebook we're also on Twitter at pinballprofile you can flood my email with sympathy at pinballprofile at gmail.com and please subscribe on iTunes, Stitcher and Google Play I'm Jeff Teolas better stronger faster © BF-WATCH TV 2021