Wow! I just came across the article below and had to share.
While I'm on day 108 post op and feeling really good about my healing and recovery I will say I'm devastated I'm not 100% yet. But I know I have to keep my chin up and keep moving forward. I will continue to fight to get back to dance...I'm just saying, today was one of those days....where my heart was breaking because I still can't do what I love most in this world....DANCE.
‘Criminal Minds’ star Matthew Gray Gubler overcomes ‘legendary’ injury
Criminal Minds fans may have noticed star Matthew Gray Gubler, who plays Dr. Spencer Reid, brandishing a cane for most of this season. That isn’t a plot point — Gubler messed up his knee pretty bad doing press for the movie (500) Days of Summer, and he’s been on the long road to recovery ever since. But these days his knee is all good when hunting bad guys on the CBS show, which airs Wednesdays. Criminal Minds is going on a break for a few weeks after tonight’s episode, and returns on March 3 with an episode Gubler himself directed. I talked with the Las Vegas native about his knee injury for this past weekend’s Who’s News page, and read below for more details about how his recovery went and the creative ways that helped him get through it.
Photos courtesy of CBS
We’ve heard from lots of readers who are worried about your knee.
I’ve actually started to feel like a regular person again. I forget which knee I even hurt at times, which is pretty amazing considering it was about a seven-month adventure. I really did a good job. If this were 50 years ago, they would have amputated the leg, so I got really lucky. It was a bad, bad injury. I just got a little too overzealous on the dance floor and managed to pretty much do something that most knee surgeons have never even thought possible or seen in their lives.
What was the official diagnosis?
I just basically dismantled the knee to the point where they were talking about experimental surgeries in Norway. They weren’t even going to try what they did because they thought it might be a lost cause. But they screwed me back together, hoping it would work and thinking it wouldn’t, and luckily my body completely took back everything. A lot of times, cartilage won’t re-adhere because there’s not much blood in it, but it was a miracle that it worked. I ended up not losing anything at all – I’m pretty much back to normal.
That’s great. So you won’t have a permanent limp?
I have a limp now and I’ve been walking with a cane for a while, but it’s going away. I won’t be permanently affected by this, which is pretty odd. It’s really a miracle. They were like, “This is one of the worst injuries we’ve ever seen.” They were saying it was pretty legendary. It’s going to go down in a textbook somewhere for sure.
At what point were you able to look at it and see it as “legendary”?
Moment one. The minute it happened, I knew it was pretty spectacular. I realized you could go one of two ways: I could take in the horrible reality, or realize that I’m lucky it wasn’t my right leg, because at least I can drive. Bad things happen – it’s how you deal with it is what makes it what it is. It made me a lot stronger and a lot more thankful for my leg. I really won in this situation.
When you showed back up to film Criminal Minds, did they try to write the injury into the show?
It was funny, they didn’t really seem to believe me. [Laughs] No one believes I could have done what I did. I think to the day that people at Criminal Minds have honestly no understanding of what kind of injury it was. They think it was just some sort of simple thing – people have knee problems, but again, if this were 40 or 50 years ago, I’d just have no leg. It was really freaking bad. And no one could really say either because it’s never been done before, so no one knew what the protocol was for rehab. They basically had no plan to follow because it was sort of a unique injury. I thought I was going to be out for four episodes on crutches, and it ended up being like 12. It was a pretty crazy thing. I had to have three surgeries. It’s a little hard to focus. It made the season incredibly tough just because when you’re in a constant state of mind-numbing pain, it’s not the easiest to chase criminals. But it made it good, and it was all for the best.
Playing Spencer Reid has been your signature role thus far in your career.
It was my first acting job, pretty much. I’m really lucky – I love the people I work with, I love the character, I love hunting criminals. It’s been a real adventure, and the knee only made it more fun. Even this injury has changed him and it makes my job a lot more fun because I get to see the progression of a human, as opposed to just Sisyphus pushing a rock up the hill or something. I know some people don’t like [Reid] – in the first couple of years, he was much more naive and innocent, he got kidnapped and a lot of terrible things happened to him that changed him for the better, and it makes him more fun to play.
You sketch drawings for your website, and you’re pretty active on Twitter. Do you like maintaining these creative outlets?
I’m a big fan of the classic showmen – P.T. Barnum, Walt Disney and people that never stopped entertaining. Actors I think have a bit of a problem in that they have to be picked to perform, which is what makes a lot of actors crazy in a way. They’re on the shelf waiting for someone to notice them, but I’ve never considered myself an actor in that regard because every day, whether two people see what I do or 18 million, I’m trying to do something to entertain. It’s great with the Internet and Twitter and everything, because I’m happy just doing stuff for my friends, but my network has grown and I have a lot of awesome fans who will watch dumb YouTube videos that I’ll make.
How much did those help you right after hurting your knee?
Oh yeah, that became a big push. The minute I hurt my knee, I started making T-shirts and stuffed animals and buttons, and I finally started writing this children’s book I’ve been working on. When you can’t move, you start definitely resorting to a little different avenues of getting stuff done. It was incredibly helpful on that regard.
Are you going to be worried about dancing ever again?
I’m on very strict instructions not to do anything until October of 2010. I can’t really do anything other than walk, so no running or dancing. I’m sure the show won’t believe me when I say that. They really have no understanding. They’ve called my doctor, and I think they think my doctor is like a paid actor who’s lying to them.
