But really, what's the worst-case scenario? I think it's an ACL reconstruction. I've had one of those before on the other knee. It sucked, and it took almost a year to recover fully, but now it works great. That's not too bad of a worst-case scenario: there are people way worse off than me.... people who can't walk, can't see, can't even take care of themselves anymore... This is okay. This is fixable. And I have lots of friends to support me whatever happens.
Even if that's what I need to do though (and I don't know yet), I'm not doing it until after the synchro skating season. I went skating last night. I'll continue skating until the national championships are over in early March. I have no intention of stopping; I'm just going to have to work around this injury until then. I've done it this long, I can manage a couple more months.
The frustrating thing is that I'm realizing it may very well not get a whole lot better. Not if it's a full tear, which seems to be what the MRI is saying. The weakness and instability will remain unless I have surgery. I kept hoping that with PT it would get stronger, so I've been skipping certain tricks. Now I suspect that I just need to find a safe way to do them anyway.