My incision, basking in the sunshine for a moment.
I start Physical Therapy tomorrow. I’m really excited and ready to go. However I checked my mobility on my stationary bike setup in the garage (which is just my recumbent trike on a trainer, which is setup with a TV in front of it. I spent some evenings pre-op out there pedaling away while I watched hockey games on the TV.) Unfortunately I am unable to get more than about a half-rotation of the pedals. My knee just won’t bend enough to fully rotate. I’m hoping that once I can turn the pedals fully I can once again watch games and get my strength and flexibility back.
As for other mobility concerns, I am now able to go up and down the stairs with a cane, albeit slowly. In fact the photo above was shot about an hour ago in our fenced dog yard between the house and the garage. I was able to go out there on my own, using cane and my dad’s old nobility scooter (with Dottie on a leash) to get the pups outside for a while. It felt good to be outside. Otherwise I spend my days in a recliner, taking laps around the house with my walker once or twice an hour.
Every day I gain a bit of strength in my right leg, but I still have a long way to go. Our TV has a screensaver that shows random pictures uploaded from my phone and when I see pictures of my past dog walks or ski days it feels like something impossible right now.
But I am maintaining a positive attitude and mindset. I know I will be better and back at it soon.
Had my post-op appointment with my surgeon’s PA today. It was my very first time out of the house since my surgery. This fact sunk into my head as I hobbled out of the front door and onto the driveway to get in the car. It was exciting at first. Getting into Linda’s car quickly dashed the excitement however as it was very uncomfortable to get my right leg through the door and positioned properly for the ride. A few painful moments and overall discomfort.
Honestly I have either been in a bed, a recliner, or a couch for the past two weeks. Yeah, I get up and move around a few minutes of almost every hour, but I haven’t really done anything else. So my body was unhappy sitting in a car. It is a ~50 minute drive to the clinic in Bend from our house. We were a tiny bit late but found a close parking spot and I hobbled into the building while Linda checked me in.
They took X-rays and they look amazing. Sadly I neglected to grab a copy, but as soon as I can I will post them here alongside my pre-op ones. I hopped on the clinic scale and noted that I am down 30lbs from my pre-op appointment in February.
Yeah!
Did some range of motion and strength tests and they are very happy with my progress. I’m told I am a bit ahead of the curve overall and ready to start PT next week. However I’m still going to be using the walker for at least two weeks more.
Since we were in Bend early in the morning we stopped at McKay Cottage for breakfast. It was delicious as always. However I was regretting not taking any pain meds as the hobbling around and getting in & out of the car was wearing on me. We stopped in Tumalo on the way home as Linda’s horse is there and she had to meet the Farrier. I sat in the car with Marky the mutt (he has stayed home with us as he is 13 years old and a very mellow dog, Whereas his crazy sisters Ripley & Dottie have been with our Dog Sitter to minimize the risk of them jumping on my leg or knocking me over!)
We finally arrived home around noon and I was wiped out. Pretty much passed out in the recliner for the rest of the afternoon. Beyond trips to PT I have to avoid that amount of time in a car. Thankfully PT is only about 15 minutes away from home.
No need for a photo today, since everything looks the same. However I can certainly claim some good progress. I climbed the stairs using a cane this morning. Previously I have been going up and down the stairs on my posterior, with no weight on my affected leg. The climb on the stairs was difficult, both the lifting of my right leg, and putting some weight on it as I raised my left leg up to the next step. Both were impossible until yesterday when I started putting some weight on my “new knee” as I hobbled around the house with the walker.
My days are sort of dull, with each hour dictated by ice/compression for X minutes, moving around the rooms for 5-10 minutes, and the rest of the time spent on a couch or in a recliner with my leg elevated. Morning starts with getting up the stairs, and evening finishes with going down the stairs to bed. I sleep with a wedge pillow under my legs to keep my knee elevated at night.
I read my kindle, my phone, listen to podcasts, or music, and watch playoff hockey every evening (great series so far, even though none of my teams have been involved!)
But the moving around parts of my day have been getting more effective lately, with steady improvement in range of motion, weight bearing, and longevity.
Other progress includes shedding most of the pain meds beyond Tylenol (and a TylenolPM in the evening to help me sleep.) I am refilling the pain meds though as PT starts next week and I’m certain things are going to hurt again.
I haven’t left the house since arriving home from surgery, but Linda and I have discussed going out for dinner one of these upcoming nights. Speaking of which, my appetite has been very low since surgery, and weight loss, which I have been working on since the surgery was scheduled (because every kilogram I lose makes recovery easier!) I’m down 13kg, and feeling good.
Tomorrow is my Post-op follow up appointment with my surgeon. I’ll let you know how it goes.
Running the ice&compression machine on the knee. My walker in the background.
One week on. As I have said before very slow, but steady and perceptible progress. I’ve taken two showers. Been down and up the stairs a few times. I’m off the Oxycodone for a full 24 hours now (may get a refill however should I need it again in the future.) Opiates and I have never had a good relationship. I have a fairly strong histamine reaction to them, making me itchy and irritable. I have only ever had them for dental work and usually stopped them after a day or two. Not really possible in this scenario because this pain is a whole different level. When you think about it, someone split my joint down the middle, pried apart everything, then sawed off the bottom of my femur, the top of my tibia & fibia, drilled some holes in the remaining bone, fitted some metal into the holes, and in the process removed most of my connective tissue that actually makes knees work. So, yeah. It HURTS.
Dr. Goolsbee bought me some Benadryl to tone down the histamine reaction and I honestly welcomed the relief that the pain medication delivered. Without it I would not been able to sleep, nor get out of the chair and move around, which is essential for recovery. I transitioned off of Oxy and onto Tramadol, which is adequate, but lacks the full “sweet relief” feeling of the Oxy. I can see why people get addicted, but honestly without the “sawzall my bones” pain chasing me I don’t need the buzz.
I can move around the house using the walker. I’m not ready for a cane or crutches yet. So I’m slow and sort of useless. I can’t carry things or do any tasks while standing that require any movement beyond hands.
The ice machine is a godsend, as it carries me through from med dose to med dose in relative comfort. It is absolutely required after any of my journeys on the stairs, as I’m usually fairly tired and sore after those.
I’m feeling some progress. Slow, but steady. VERY thankful for the months of work I put in getting my body ready for this. I hit the gym two to four times a week, focus on strength training and flexibility. The payoff has been making getting up and around easier. Getting up and down to/from seated is easy using one leg and one arm only (the other hand just serves for balance.) I’ve helped others in this situation and it is no fun to watch them struggle and pull on you. Linda is a lot smaller than I so I don’t want to put her in any danger.
Speaking of Linda, having a Doctor here taking care of me has been a blessing. She has kept me on the clock for meds and whatnot, a task my drug-addled post-op brain could never perform! Given her issues (eye surgeries, aneurism stent & coil, a broken foot, and hip replacement) and my care for her during those episodes she is doing great repaying that debt.
Not much to see (yet.)
The pain has been kept under control, except for this afternoon when I, feeling great and home alone, went two hours past my dosage time and suddenly felt awful. Totally my fault. Linda left with instructions to take X at Y:o’clock and I forgot.
Range of motion is coming back slowly. Still using a walker to get around, and probably will continue until my first post-op Dr. appointment next week.
I’m on a Facebook group for TKR support and I swear the folks are a bunch of whiners. Yeah, it hurts. Taking a robotic sawzall to your bones is never going to be pain free! Lots of people clearly didn’t know what they were getting into and have just assumed it would be easy. Suck it up buttercups!
I keep having super vivid dreams about doing things that I haven’t been able to, so really looking forward to getting into physical therapy soon.
Surgery was Friday morning. They couldn’t get the spinal block to work so fell back to general anesthesia. We were home by early afternoon, and the sole challenge was getting up the stairs to the main floor. I’ve been there ever since. Friday was good. I was doing laps around the kitchen, feeling okay. Slept in a recliner with my legs elevated and in an ice/compression sleeve. Saturday was a big step back. The anesthesia wore off and I experienced severe pain and discomfort. I was under instructions to get up and move around every hour. I mostly complied but it wasn’t fun. At. All. I probably slept half the day away in a haze of pain killers. Watched some playoff hockey.
Sunday was more of the same, except towards the end of the day I noted a slight improvement in pain, especially with some of the basic exercises (ankle flex especially). The compression stockings came off. By Sunday night, watching the St. Louis v Winnipeg playoff game finishing in double overtime, I was feeling pretty good. Mobility is still difficult but my pain levels are dropping noticeably.
I don’t like taking serious painkillers for two reasons: I get a serious histamine reaction (itchy all over) and I end up having extremely vivid dreams that sometimes startle me into moving in ways that are counterproductive to healing.
Now on day three and I have relocated to a different part of the upstairs for the day. Hopefully things will continue to progress positively.
Way back in my twenties I did some damage to this part of me. Well, it wasn’t intentional, as I bent it in a direction it was never intended when two other grown men fell on top of me while we were playing a “beer league” hockey game on a Wednesday night in Seattle. I bounced up off the ice and continued to play, but the next time I went down on that knee to stop a puck I could barely get back up again. I was at the far end of the rink from the dressing rooms, but I just skated off, leaving the players shrugging and asking “WTF!?” at me as I left play. (Hockey is really dull to play without a goaltender!)
I peeled off my gear to find my right knee looking like a bruised grapefruit of unusual size. I had a few arthroscopic surgeries and a lot of rehabilitation and physical therapy over the next few years, but it has never been the same. My first doctor said that that I could continue playing hockey. A subsequent doctor told me “If you want to be able to walk when you’re an old man you should probably stop playing hockey.” That was five years after the initial injury. I quit playing, but continued being active in other ways, specifically officiating ice hockey for another decade, because I love the sport, and wanted to remain involved. Eventually I stopped working games as it kept me away from my kids too much.
I kept on skiing though. I adapted my skiing style to minimize risk to that knee. I still ski to this day, and beyond riding my bike (which I only do to keep in shape, such as it is, to continue skiing) it is my primary form of recreation and exercise.
Back in the 90s my Orthopedic surgeon suggested a total knee replacement, but stressed that the procedure was in a state of constant evolution and improvement, so probably best to just keep an eye on that progress and pick a time later in life when my original equipment is causing more problems and discomfort than a replacement surgery would. That time is now at hand. My right leg is noticeably shorter than my left, so I walk with a limp. I start each day feeling okay, but if I walk enough I end up swollen and in pain. I would like to be more active, but this knee holds me back. I often descend stairs backwards, because if I face downward while stepping down, my limited range of motion throws me off balance just as my left foot is about to touch the stair below. So carrying things down stairs is almost impossible. I have to sleep on the right side of any bed so I can hang my right heel off the edge, because I can’t straighten my right leg. If I don’t do this and I actually sleep with a straight right leg I will wake up in pain of having my bone-on-bone all night long.
Spot the difference!
I have been scheduled for this surgery a couple of times now, the first for the summer of 2020, (guess what stopped that one) and again in Colorado during our aborted relocation there. But now it is definitely happening this coming Friday.
The same surgeon that worked on Linda’s hip will be doing the surgery on my knee. I picked this date to coincide with the end of the ski season (and NHL Playoffs on the TV), but with enough recovery time for Nick & Izzy’s wedding in early July. I’ve been working out in a gym since September, with a lot of emphasis on my legs. I hope that my efforts will pay off with a swift recovery.
Dr. Goolsbee will be helping me through this recovery with her amazing patience and kindness. As soon as I am able I will update you all on progress, but I imagine my weekend and early next week will be spent in an opiate haze.
