Marching forward 3 weeks after surgery.

It’s been more than 3 weeks since my surgery and I’m gearing up to head back to work on Monday. Aside from the emotional struggles, I’d say the physical side of this situation has been better than expected. It helps to be young(ish) and in shape(ish) ahead of time, but also it helps that I’m determined to do what I can, regardless of the crutches. For better or worse, that’s my personality and being independent is a huge part of what makes me, me. 

I’ve had to slow down. Obviously. Falling would be the worst thing (I’ve been reminded of this many times by the medical team), so I have to remind myself to think about what I’m planning on doing before I do it. But there is very little I haven’t been able to do while non-weight bearing. 

I grocery shopped alone once. This was humorous and I was planning to try and crutch and push a real cart but that really was not working. So the store had scooters and I used one! For a bigger trip, I took one of my kids who pushed the cart while I crutched alongside. Most recently I took my husband (who’s blind) and he pushed the cart, while I crutched and verbally navigated him through the store. THAT was a sight (pun intended), but we were successful, and he got a taste of what buying a week’s worth of groceries for our family is like. 

I cooked Thanksgiving dinner for my little family of 4, on crutches. It took almost 2 full days and required carrying-type help from the 3 other humans in the house, but it got done and was actually a lot of fun. 

I’ve been able to put laundry away using the table on wheels my mom lent me (place folded laundry on it, crutch/push it room to room to put clothes away). This is an example of something that takes far too long, but is totally possible. This would be more difficult if we had carpeting I imagine. 

Showering is no longer a daunting task. I’m not even sure it takes much longer than usual at this point. The shower chair is still totally required, but I’ve got a whole system down that works quite well. The biggest worry is using crutches near water. Water increases the likelihood of slipping with the crutches. So every move has to be purposeful. 

The strangest part about showering (aside from sitting during the whole thing) is shaving a leg that is totally numb over a large area!  Inside the red line on the picture above, I have no feeling on the skin. If I close my eyes and touch any area there, I can tell that there’s pressure, but couldn’t tell you where I’m being touched or if it is sharp or dull. It is a very bizarre feeling!

Driving is going quite well. Driving longer distances (which I haven’t done much of) is pretty uncomfortable, but going around the city hasn’t been too bad. Getting in and out of the car is annoying and I feel like there’s no way I’m going to fit with my brace, but once I’m in, it’s all good. The roads with the most potholes leave me cringing with some pain, but it’s temporary and I know which ones to avoid for the most part. 

Changing the sheets on my kids’ bunk beds was an interesting undertaking. If you’ve never changed bunk bed sheets, consider yourself lucky. If you have, you know that it often requires help even when you aren’t on crutches. My oldest helped get the fitted sheet on the top bunk, and that was really the only thing I could not do (the whole climbing a ladder with only one leg seemed like a bad idea). And not even 5 minutes after I got the beds made, my youngest son came in and ripped his bed apart thinking we were still in the “strip the bed” phase. I kinda totally lost it on him, and then apologized as we re-made the bed together. I explained to him that making a bed feels like running 5 miles to me right now. 

 I’ve walked the dogs, once in the past 3 weeks. It was easy in terms of the dog part (I have 2 small dogs who are plodders and are well behaved on leash), but the crutching around the block was less than awesome. Luckily my husband and kids have taken 99.9% responsibility for the dogs. 

One thing I have not done, or had to do yet, is clean my house. I could, I guess, but it would take me forever and I can’t imagine how exhausting it would be. I’ve never had another person clean my house. Ever. I actually like to clean, so I’ve just always done it. I also HATE paying for something that I can do on my own...so yeah, never had a cleaning person. I was lucky enough to have my sister (who has her own cleaning business) come and clean once right after my surgery. Knowing I would need cleaning help I got a recommendation from friends for a woman who cleans homes in the city. So I will use her until January, maybe February, depending on how I’m feeling with my knee at that point. She cleaned for the first time yesterday and she’s lovely, but I feel very weird about it. 

I read a few blogs about recovery from this surgery where the person described quickly getting tired of everyone asking about their knee. I kind of felt like that sounded weird...how could you get tired of people being concerned for you?  It seemed nice that people would ask about how your knee is. 

Well, I can confirm that it’s tiring to answer the “wow, what did you do?” question. It’s not that I don’t appreciate concern, but literally almost every person I see asks me what happened, no matter what here I am. 

Mostly, these are strangers. 

And it often it turns into a 10 minute conversation where I hear about their injuries and arthritis and aches and opinions about medicine and not trusting surgeons.

I started this by answering the question completely (the whole surgery name). Now I say “oh I hurt my knee” hoping it sounds boring enough to prevent further questions...

So what’s next???

Work. That’s tomorrow. That’s crazy. 

CPM machine for only 3 more days. Hooray!

Sleeping without my brace in 3 more days!!!

I am looking forward to the one month mark, and getting stronger in every way. 

Speaking of stronger...look at these crutch arms! Maybe I’ll be doing a pull-up sooner than later!