4 weeks out

I am now 4 weeks since my surgery. I have ditched the crutch and am using the brace if I know I will be on my feet alot. Last weekend a group of us went to the Royals game and I cleaned out the gutters which was much needed. My knee was really sore after that. The pain is all gone from surgery but it just gets really sore if I try to do much more than walking around the house or office.

I visited the doc this morning for my 1 month eval. They had 2 months since surgery written on the chart and said that I looked pretty good for 2 months out. When I told them that it had only been 4 weeks, they seemed to be impressed. Must be the therapist. My strength is there in the ligament which I think is what they really wanted to check. I am still having trouble getting full extension. They didn't seem as concerned as I was about that. They said part of that is probably due to swelling and the fact that I have been on it alot recently.

I was able to mow the backyard and do some chores this morning before we hopped on the train for Savannah. I am kind of looking forward to being forced into sitting down for the next 36 hours or so. I will still have to get up and around to keep it from getting stiff. The wedding should be fun and I am looking forward to seeing Savannah. Hopefully it isn't rainy there.

I have been going to PT 2-3 times a week. Danielle is working with me on more strengthening and stability exercises. Both the docs and Danielle have said that the pain should be gone in a few weeks but my quad is nowhere near where it should be. That will probably take 4-6 months to come most of the way back. My knee will be sore if I am up and around on it alot during this time because it will be making up for the lack of a quad.

Well... Off to do nothing on a train for god knows how much longer... I am hungry.

One Crutch McGee

I was at PT MWF again last week. Now that I started this log, I forget when my last post was. I was at PT on Friday and adding some more exercises. I am missing a couple degrees of extension which is really starting to bother me. The flexion comes much easier than the extension. I can bend it back to 130 degrees with some pain. Danielle worked with me on getting me down to one crutch. My leg is still pretty weak but it is a heck of a lot stronger than it was. I know that it is getting stronger and feeling better everyday so that is a positive I try to take away. And... I almost forgot... I have lost some of the steristrips off my knee. One came off of my scope hole and a couple fell off of the incision while I was sleeping the other night.

I was one crutch and hobbling around her office. It is strange because when I am on my leg for a while, my leg does not want to flex back. I don't know if it is a muscle thing or what. All I know is that something feels like it pops inside my knee and then I am able to bring it back much easier. I need to get better at making a conscious effort to walk with bringing my knees up and kicking my foot back. Right now it is looking pretty frankenstienian with one leg sweeping out as I make a stride. My legs get so tired sore so quickly when I am up and around. Last night Danielle and I were at the grocery store. I just used the cart as a walker and left the crutch all together. I was about to throw a hissyfit near the frozen turkeys because I was standing waiting for love to find 1lb of ground chuck...

I am going to try and make it up to the gym tonight. I have a feeling it will be a zoo up there.. :(. My throat was sore this morning and I am not sleeping all that well so I decided to sleep an extra hour this morning.

We leave for Savannah in 9 days. I'd like to be off crutches completely by then. = I probably need to get my ass out of bed in the mornings...

PT and post opp appt

It has been a while since my last entry and a lot has happened. I visited with one of the surgeons on Wednesday morning and I had PT on Wednesday and Friday. The surgeon said that everything went really well with my procedure and they were really happy with it. He checked out my knee and we looked at some of the images they took. I told him what my ROM was from Monday and he said that they really wanted to see that up to 90 soon. They wanted me off crutches in a couple weeks and out of the brace a week or two after that.

My Dad picked me up from home and took me to PT Wednesday night. I worked on the bike a little bit by doing some rocking as well as some other exercises. I felt much better than I did on Monday. I still had some swelling but the big good news was that I got my flexion up to 91 degrees. It was a huge step from Monday.

Friday I was back at PT. Again, I could tell a big difference from the previous visit. I was able to make a full rotation on the bike. My flexion was all the way to 109 degrees. I am still missing 3-4 degrees of straightening which is a huge concern. I was joking with Danielle that I feel like the measurements is kind of like the weigh in on the Biggest Loser... I have put up some pretty good numbers so far.

My knee/hamstring is still painful. I feel more comfortable when putting weight on my right leg. My hamstring feels more secure. Right after I got unwrapped, anytime I over extended my leg, I had this shooting pain through my hamstring. That is happening less and less. I still have a good amount of bruising around my knee and hamstring. I was on my feet a lot on Saturday and I felt like I was paying for it Saturday night. My legs felt like they were going to fall off when I got into bed on Saturday night.

I go in for PT again after work this evening. I hope that this is the last week that I need to bum rides off of people. It will be nice to drive myself around again. I feel better every day. I can't wait till I am able to walk around again with no pain. I can't wait to go ride my bike or go running or do anything. It has been almost 2 months since I have done anything more than hobble around and it has been driving me crazy...