10 days out

10 days out of surgery and I'm still very much on crutches! I am getting soooooo sick of these guys. I'm putting more weight on my toe every day though, so I need to remember that and stay positive.

I got this cool toy at physical therapy last week: they're electrodes, and they send a current into my quad muscle to remind it how to fire. It reminds me of those As-Seen-On-TV commercials for the "Belly Burner" (featuring the guy eating chips and watching t.v. saying, "I can't believe I'm working out!") It's cool, it makes my quad muscle tense up, which they can't quite do on their own yet. I also use it on a lower setting for pain relief, which feels amaaaaaaazing. Is it possible to become addicted to a low electrical impulse? I'm scared I'm going to resort to sticking my finger in a light socket to get my fix after I have to return this guy.

Of course I've been getting excellent care from my "nurses" :) They are sooooooo helpful! They very kindly create moving obstacle courses so I can test my reflexes and practice sharp turns on my crutches, and they also provide a customized "bath" service, featuring personalized licking and stinky breath. I don't know what I'd do without them!

And just for your viewing pleasure, here are a couple more pics of my sexy knees:

This one is of the teeny wound left behind after the first of the steri-strips came off. It's pretty small, hopefully it won't leave much of a scar!

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And this one is a comparison of my swollen left and normal right knees. There's not much of a knee to be seen in the left one. Ice, ice ice.

One week musings

This is my leg one week out of surgery. It's doing ok! No bruising, and the swelling isn't bad. In this pic you can see steri-strips covering all the smaller incisions and band-aids over the biggest one (I think that's where the arthroscope went in?) They're healing well. My range of motion is good too--I'm at 125 degrees now, and 140 is considered "normal". I hate to brag (ok, no I don't) but my PT said this is one of the best looking knees she's seen a week out of surgery :-)

It's still really weak though--I guess it just takes time for the soft tissue to heal, and there's nothing you can do to rush that. I wish there was. I'm sick of crutches. I'm trying to use them the right way (all the weight on your palms, with no pressure on your armpits) but my underarms are still bruised.

I completely stopped taking Oxycodone yesterday, and I've since realized how much I hate that stuff. I didn't realize until it was out of my system how foggy it makes me feel. I've felt so much more lucid and more motivated the last two days! It was hard for me to force myself to do even my simple PT routine two days ago, whereas today I feel so much more energetic and engaged. I guess I shouldn't attribute all that to the Oxycodone--I'm only a week out of surgery, so obviously every day is going to make a big difference at this point.

Good news: I made my first social outing last night! I went out with a couple of friends to go watch bluegrass music at a bar I like. It was fun, but also hard. I take up so much space--I have to keep my leg propped up and fully extended, and even though I was constantly adjusting my padding and brace and it was still very uncomfortable. Plus crutches are the clumsiest things ever. I'm already a very clumsy person by nature, so put me on crutches and I really don't stand a chance. I feel like I make a huge scene everywhere I go, like an elephant walking into a room. Of course within ten minutes of arriving at the bar I'd knocked over a drink :-( Oy. At least everyone's extremely nice to a person on crutches!

Whenever I get sick, I do this weird thing where I try to imagine what would've happened to me if I'd been afflicted with the same malady as a serf in the middle ages.

I think I would've survived this! At least as long as I could've taken a couple of weeks off to heal after the initial tear. Obviously I wouldn't have had any kind of reconstructive surgery, but I think based on where I was at before surgery, I would've made do and continued working the land, or whatever it was serfs did...

*Can you tell I'm going out of my mind with boredom?*

Things you should have before undergoing ACL surgery (in no particular order):

1) A mantra. Can't stress the importance of this enough, at least for me. It's been massively helpful for me to have something simple to repeat over and over in my head at tough moments (like when I was fighting off tears as they wheeled me into surgery; when I woke up nauseous and feeling like hell; during the pain of the rehab exercises; and whenever I'm generally frustrated). This is corny and a bit embarrassing (and I am completely bastardizing the Ayurvedic concept), but mine is "Ride to Montauk". One of my rehab goals is to save up for a road bike. Next summer I want to do a "century" (a 100-mile bike ride) from Babylon to Montauk. This is motivating and it generates a relaxing mental picture for me. It keeps me looking forward and reminds me that no, this won't be forever. Feel free to borrow it :) Another possibility: "Clear eyes, full hearts, can't lose."

2) A flexible shower head. It makes bathing a whole lot easier after surgery.

3) Flexibility and ab strength. I promise, this is a very worthwhile pre-surgery goal! Being able to touch your toes without bending your knee will make your life a lot easier post-surgery. And just try standing up while keeping one leg straight and non-weight-bearing: you'll see what I mean about the ab strength. My abs are really sore at the end of the day, every day, even though I'm basically just hanging out in bed. Tearing my ACL was, like, the best core workout EVER.

4) Supportive friends and family. I'm so grateful for everyone who has helped me to stave off insanity throughout this process. Especially my mom, who has been a real champ. I don't know what I would've done without her.

5) A yoga mat. Very helpful for doing rehab exercises!

6) Tote and messenger bags: a crutch-user's best friend.

7) A comfortable "command center", complete with chargers and a power source, water bottle, reading material, a melange of pillows, and your personal pharmacy. You will want everything within arm's reach. Set this up before you go in for surgery!

8) A notepad and pen on hand, for keeping track of your meds. This was massively complicated (at least IMHO, but I'm horrible with this sort of thing). I'm lucky my mom quickly set up a simple system for me. Add a little Oxycodone to my already-poor working memory and I definitely would've OD'd without this. Mine is simple: the name of the drug, the hours apart I'm supposed to take it, and if I need to eat with it. Then I write down the time every time I take it. Example:

Oxycodone (6 hrs, EAT) 9pm, 12am, 6:30am

Tylenol (6 hrs) 10am, 4pm, 10pm

You get the idea... Maybe this occurs to everyone else on earth, but it didn't occur to me!

9) A knog! (That's a knee-blog.) This is soooooooo self-indulgent, and I'm sure it would be massively boring to anyone other than me, but it's nice to have an outlet. And I think in a year I'll be glad to have this to look back on to see that yes, I have made some progress. (Or maybe I'll think the same thing I think now: that it's massively self-indulgent and boring.)

The Art of the Sponge Bath

My daily cleaning ritual, oddly enough, is my favorite part of the day. There is something about being clean that I find fundamentally necessary to my sanity. After I initially tore my ACL, being able to take a shower was crucial to feeling human again. It's the same thing post-surgery, but I've had to change my approach because I have to keep the incision sites dry.

After the initial tear, I hopped/flung myself into the shower and showered standing on one leg. It was incredibly precarious, and I'm lucky: a) the shower rod didn't collapse when I used it for leverage; and b) I didn't slip. It could have been disastrous. This time, there's no question of actually getting into the shower since I can't get my left leg wet at all. So I do a modified sponge bath, which is surprisingly effective!

It requires more equipment than a normal shower: I use two big towels, one small one, and a wash cloth. It's also extremely helpful to have a removable flexible shower head. It makes it soooooo much easier to wash your hair! [Stupidly, this didn't even occur to me until my mom asked if I'd been using theirs. The first time I washed my hair after surgery, I did it very awkwardly in the sink.] The whole thing is done sitting down next to the bathtub. It works surprising well! It's also interesting to see how little water you actually need to get clean.

It's a weirdly relaxing process--I recommend sponge baths for everyone!

Back in the (Legasus) saddle

I'm now two days out of surgery. To fill you in:

I've been cutting down on my pain meds pretty quickly. I started out with an arsenal of Oxycodone, Toradol, Tylenol, and an anti-nausea pill to take with the Oxycodone and Toradol. I'm also supposed to take Aspirin every day. I don't like taking the Oxycodone because it makes me sleepy, and I'm almost out of Toradol because the doc didn't want to prescribe too much (I guess anti-inflammatories counter-intuitively actually slow down healing) so now I'm pretty much down to the Tylenol. The pain has been surprisingly mild, actually. I guess I missed out on the worst pain by spending the first night and day in the hospital--they kept me really doped up there. I'm obviously staying off my knee and being really gentle with it, but as long as I ice and elevate, I haven't felt much need for extensive pharmaceuticals.

I've been doing some quad exercises since the day of surgery: leg lifts and quad tightening exercises every hour or two while I'm awake. The quad muscle atrophies amazingly quickly--not sure if that's because of the surgery or because of the tendons that were taken out of my hamstring. I've also been using a continuous passive motion machine, which I lobbied for. It's called "the Legasus"--isn't that glorious? It sounds so majestic! Apparently it's the same technology my uncle used when he tore his ACL 30 years ago. Anyway, I'm strapped into it for a couple of 2-hour shifts every day. I started with it set at about 35 degrees on Wednesday, and I already have it up to 75! It's kind of nice in the beginning when you see so much progress so quickly because there's nowhere to go but up... Oh, and as you can see, I still have to wear a ridiculous Dr. Seuss stocking. It's supposed to prevent blood clots. It's really not bad, I barely notice it, it just looks silly :)

So basically I've just been sleeping and watching lots of t.v. and movies. I discovered "Jersey Shore" is on my mom's On Demand--happy day!

Today, I had my first post-op doctor's appointment. It went well! He said my wounds look great--he even took the stitches out well ahead of schedule and replaced them with steri-strips so I wouldn't have to keep them in until my next appointment in two weeks. It was nice to get the gigantic gauze wrap off, so now I can see what my knee actually looks like. It's swollen, but a lot less scary than I imagined. [Side note: Can you see my doc's initials under my knee? They autograph you before surgery while you're still awake to make sure they don't accidentally replace the wrong ACL!]

The plan now is to stay the course: continue with the quad exercises and the Legasus; keep icing, elevating, and wearing the stocking; and take it easy.

I start PT on Monday (oddly enough, I'll be seeing a woman I went to high school with!) That will be nice--PT back in BK was incredibly helpful, and it gave me a lot of things to do on my own at home. I'm excited to get started.

Ughhhhhhh

If you are about to have ACL surgery, you probably should not read this... Consider yourself warned.

My surgery on Tues actually went well. It took the doctor longer than he expected ("It looked like raw hamburger in there," as the anesthesiologist put it), but everything came out ok. BUT, I had a horrible reaction to the general anesthetic. I spent the whole night puking/dry heaving and had to stay in the hospital overnight so they could keep me hydrated and give me pain meds through an IV. I don't think I'm exaggerating when I say it was the worst night of my life to date. Absolutely miserable. I got my own room, and the whole staff was amazingly nice so I really have no complaints on that front. It's just that when you're in the hospital, people come in to poke you and prod you every hour to make sure your blood pressure, pulse, etc. are all ok. So I got very little sleep, in spite of being heavily medicated.

This morning I felt much better. I was finally able to eat, for the first time in about 36 hours. Even the disgusting hospital food looked good! I kept that down and I was able to keep an oxycodone down, so they finally let me go home this afternoon.

The one good thing about the hospital was that they gave me pain meds intravenously, so I never had any pain. I'm holding off on oxycodone right now because a guy's coming over in a bit to fit me for a CPM machine and I'd like to be awake for that... So now I'm not nauseous, but I'm getting pretty sore. Fun stuff.

The pic above is my knee in my hardcore brace and an ever-flow ice thing. It keeps my knee continuously cool.