Next to normal

I am just over 3 months post-surgery and my knee is doing great! I got back on the elliptical two weeks ago, and now I'm up to 20 minutes at a time at 10 to 12 resistance. It feels sooooo good to do a "normal" workout again!

My PT told me last week that she wants to get me on a running program, then she thinks I'll be ready to graduate. That means I should be done in about 6 more PT sessions. I have mixed feelings about it... I actually really enjoy PT. My therapist is great, and I feel like with the long hours I put in at work, I need that forced workout every week. It's like personal training. And the massages (when she does them) are amaaaaaazing. I don't know what she does, but she applies pressure to tendons or muscles or bands or something in my hamstring and thigh, and when I leave my knee feels 1000x better. But on the other hand, my copay is $50 (yeah, that's right, copay) so it will be nice to save that $200 a month.

I've been biking to work almost every day, and I feel like that helps a lot--especially since I don't get to the gym anywhere close to as much as I'd like to. I also think living in NYC is good for rehab: I've been forced to walk around a ton since the moment I got back in September. That was horrible at first, but in the long run I think it probably meant for a shorter recovery time. It took me a long time to get off crutches at home (in fact, it didn't happen until I got back to NYC) and I think that was largely due to the fact that I did so little moving around. I hobbled from the couch to the bed and back again, and that was primarily the extent of my mobility. As soon as I got home though, I had a lot of incentive to get off crutches (well, single crutch by that time) ASAP.

I still stand by what I said about being retired from soccer, but I'm looking forward to more normal athletics. It will be nice to be able to jog again, and maybe next winter I'll be ready to snowboard. I also want to take a dance class as soon as I'm able. (That won't be for awhile though--I was reading the description for a swing class at a studio my friend goes to, and it said "must wear shoes you can pivot comfortably in"--eek!)

My scar is fading really well too. There are only tiny marks where the small incisions were, and the big incision has already faded quite a bit. I think that one will always be visible, but not too bad. I was comparing scars with a friend who tore her ACL in high school last weekend, and although she's 12 years out from a patellar graft, mine is really not much worse.

So lots of good to report on the knee front. And in the interest of FINALLY publishing an upbeat post, we'll just leave it at that :)