Slow and Steady

I went to see Dr. Trice yesterday and he was pleased with my progress and said I am right on track. The primary message I took away from the appointment was to stay cautious. As I feel better, I will want to do more, but I really need to still be protecting the implant as it hardens. So absolutely no weight-bearing exercises are allowed. He doesn't even want me to use the elliptical or walk any more than needed. I need to stay in tortoise mode and not be tempted to be more like the hare. So, I can pretty much just use the bike or swim.

Speaking of which, he thought the Aqua Arthritis class was a great idea so he signed the paperwork and now I am all signed up. It starts in September, but now that I have access to a pool I may just go and do some water-walking sometime.

20 Weeks

I am doing pretty well. I still have a bad limp and have to focus on how to walk, but I am not in much pain. My muscles ache a lot and my knee gets sore sometimes, but that is so little compared to before. People still wince when they see me and I get a lot of pity conversations from strangers. I try to convey that this is so much better, but I think that just scares them to even imagine what I've been through. I guess you don't really know what you can handle until you have had to face it, and my Big Scary Stuff is behind me now. It's just a part of my life.

My scar was healing up pretty rough (like a thick purple rope) so I looked into scar minimizing products. The two that seem most successful are Bio-oil and silicone strips. The Bio-oil sounded messy and since another patient at PT was praising the silicone strips, I am trying the strips. They are available on Amazon and the brand I am using is Scar Away. They seem to be working but they do take some getting used to. The silicone is only sticky when it is dry, which makes cleaning them easy. I clean them every day and wear each for about a week before discarding. The more you wear it, the more effective it seems to be. Don't be tempted to get the shorter ones and just use two to cover the long scar. I didn't see the long ones when I was first looking so I got the short ones. They are a waste of money. The longer ones stay on so much better!

I have my next appointment on Monday and I will be asking Dr. Trice about aquatics classes. The local YMCA has an Arthritis Aquatics class that I think will be perfect for continued strengthening. It requires my doctor to sign off on it, and I already picked up the form to bring with me. I hope they will let me participate. I'm not an arthritis sufferer, but I sure would benefit from the class. I think the other aquatics classes would be too vigorous right now, but I may give them a shot in a few months.

So yeah, I am doing alright but I still have a long way to go. My spirits have been higher lately though because the list of things I can do keeps growing and because there is so little pain. I am so happy to be recovering!

Phase 3

Technically I am in phase 3 now, but there is no sudden change of activity or guidance. Everything is gradual. I did however ask if we could do a few new exercises in PT and Sandy showed me a few. They really were very simple stretching exercises mostly, but she warned I might be sore. When this morning rolled around, I sure was!

It can be frustrating how exhausted I get after doing such simple things. However, things are getting easier. I went to the grocery store again this past weekend and it was easier than the first time. The only way to get better is to keep pushing myself, but the recovery from each effort is still daunting.

First Day Back in the Office and Other Things

In the past week I have challenged myself 3 times and boy am I beat! On Sunday I went to the grocery store with my husband and I walked through the entire trip! I used the cart to support myself and didn't make any extraneous trips. If we forgot something my husband went back for it, and he found it nice that my default slow speed meant I was usually still about where he left me when he got back! I normally have a tendency to wander off. (Ooh something shiny!) Anyway, by the end of the trip I was absolutely shaking from the effort and very weak, but it was still very satisfying. I iced as soon as I got home and rested. Overall it was a good experience.

Building on that success, I went into the office on Tuesday. I managed to make it 6 hours before thecrazy nerve tingles in my knee got out of hand. It's not pain exactly, just uncomfortable niggling tingles shooting through my knee. They get worse as I spend more time in one position, and eventually get constant and very distracting. There was some soreness as I walked out of the office too. I came home, applied ice, and rested until the tingles stopped. However, the next day I was so exhausted I felt almost ill so I guess I needed that next day to recover. It's the weak muscles that are such a huge limitation now. Ice makes the tingles go away quickly, but building muscles means wearing them out first. I just lost so much muscle in my entire body by being inactive for so long.

Then yesterday I really pushed myself. I drove 2 hours to a meeting and then 2 hours back afterward. Driving has been pretty easy, but can cause those nerve tingles since it is a lot of sitting. I arrived early for the meeting and found a spare office to remove my brace and ice right away. That helped a lot. I made it through the meeting and drove back, going straight to PT where I took it pretty easy. I was so tired I felt a little disoriented, but no harm was done. It did take me a long time to get out of bed today though.

Other things going on besides me wiping myself out repeatedly: The cane use appears to be aggravating a tendon in my shoulder causing a pinched feeling. I was trying to treat it with heat and massage, but Sandy, my PT, said to cut that out and use ice. I am never sure which to reach for since random pain is just random pain to me. She said it was probably an inflamed tendon so ice should calm it. She also gave me a sample of BioFreeze, which feels pretty cool (hee hee). I need to focus on getting away from the cane soon anyway, so this is further motivation.

Also, (insert drum roll!) I have a new lesson learned.

Lesson Learned # 12: Keep icing regularly even when the swelling stops. As I increased my activity, Sandy instructed me to ice regularly. The ice has had the unexpected effect of making the straight leg raises (SLR) easier! It is finally not so painful to get in a good "locked" position. The SLR are probably the single most valuable (and most difficult) rehab exercise. I wish I had known regular icing would help with them earlier, but I am glad I figured it out.

So overall, I am making progress and wiping myself out a lot. But hey, I am not going to get better by sitting on my bum. Well, at least not all the time. I am still exhausted from yesterday, so excuse me while I go sit on my bum for a little while. But this weekend I will be back to grocery shopping.

Stairs

I was talking with my physical therapist and she said that after we enter Phase 3 she would teach me how to walk on stairs again! I have been just taking each step one at a time with my bad leg straight. I've been doing that for so long that I actually got excited at the idea of being able to walk normally up and down stairs! And then I get a little embarrassed that I got a little excited. But seriously, my house has three floors and tons of stairs. I can't wait to relearn them!

She did say not to try it on my own first. That is definitely something to begin with her guidance.

I still plan on walking around the grocery store this weekend. If it goes well, I will start going into the office. My job has been great since they have been letting me work from home. Before my surgery, days in the office were my most painful. The concrete floors there just killed my knee. I am a little nervous about going back, but the grocery store seems like a good test to see if I am ready.

No More Whining (13 weeks and 5 days)

I have been hesitant to post lately because the progress is so slow it just feels like whining. In reality, I am not whining much and am actually pretty happy with the current state of my knee. No, it's not feeling awesome. But it feels much better than it used to! So I will try to keep posting, but focus on what has changed rather than the current state.

I had an appointment with Dr. Trice today and he was pleased with my progress at the three month mark, but said I am about two weeks behind so he wanted me to wait another two weeks before beginning Phase 3 of the recovery protocol. Phase 3 is a substantial return to activity so I am obviously excited, even if I know that it will be gradual. He also pointed out that at this time the implanted cells should be changing from a jelly-like consistency to a waxy consistency, so I still need to protect them. No squatting or twisting! I really wasn't planning on doing that anyway. :)

I am feeling like I haven't pushed myself as much lately. The little things are getting easier, like walking into a store but not around it. That used to wipe me out just a few weeks ago, but this past weekend I was less affected by it. So I was thinking that I might try grocery shopping (like actually walking around the store) with my husband this weekend. If I get tired there are places to sit and it is nice and level, as opposed to walking outside.

I have noticed a change in how each step feels. I realized that as I took each step, the knee would settle into a position as the weight went through it. There was a lot of movement and shifting going on and I walked so very slowly to allow that shifting and settling to occur. As my muscles around the joint have gotten stronger, there seems to be less settling when I put weight through it. As a result, I am actually walking a little faster. I just noticed this happening in the past week, but I sure like it!

Nearly 13 Weeks

I just reread the last post here and realized how slowly things are changing. On June 3rd I was hoping to drive soon and I was occasionally going without the cane in the house. Now it is June 21 and I am driving short distances and regularly going without the cane in the house. Hmm. That doesn't seem that much of a change for 18 days.

So it goes. I am getting a little stronger. Every few days I just catch myself feeling maybe not so weak. On Saturday I actually ran a few errands. I can't shop for groceries, but I could walk into the grocery store, find one thing in the produce section, and go straight to the checkout. It was a huge challenge! So, does that deserve a woohoo? Meh. I wouldn't have done that on June 3rd, so I guess it is progress.

The straight leg raises are still very painful and are really the only part of PT where I haven't come a long way. Whenever I do them, I try to do 40-50 total. The first ten are one at a time, and I rest after each. I try to visualize the pain as water flowing over me and dissipating, flowing down to the floor and away from me. The second ten I do in sets of 5, and if I can, the rest I do in sets of ten. They get easier as I go, which is why I can keep increasing the number in each set.

Last week I was having a particularly hard time and could only manage sets of 5 all the way through to 50. I had been pondering why and I think I have figured it out. It was the same culprit as before: those stupid prone exercises! My leg had been straightening easily so I thought I could cut them out finally, but spending a little time prone seemed to help something shift in the knee so that it was less painful to lock it straight. Honestly, the remaining pain I am dealing with is very hard to describe, so forgive me for failing to convey it. It just hurts whenever I rely on the muscles around the knee to support it. That occurs when I lock it straight, lift the leg in any way, or if it has been in one position for too long and the muscles cramp from holding it there.

I am still in less pain than before the surgery and I try to keep that in mind. However, I am pretty sick of being a little weakling. Meep.