[Vizigoth]

Be sure to get a referral to a good sports medicine doctor. If your cartilage is frayed, it has likely received a multitude of small to medium traumas, though Liza would be a better judge of that than I. Do/did you do a lot of contact sports? If you let it go long enough, your joint will just pound the miniscus into tiny bits that will jam your joint for years until a doctor goes in there to vacuum out the debris. If you do have the surgery, the recovery time can be fairly quick if your doctor is skilled enough to get it done quickly yet perfectly. You might actually encounter more complications from the anesthesia. I am lucky enough to have one of the great Orthopedic Surgeons in the region. The guy is an artist. After three major joint surgeries, I was back on my feet in a week with two of them, and a month after a tibular platform (lower portion of the knee joint) was splintered into nine pieces.