I’m almost 8 weeks post-surgery now and I feel like most of the pain and frustration is over, I think. I had a follow-up appointment with my surgeon at the 4 week mark and he gave the green light to step up my rehab and push through my discomfort further. In other words “harden up”! That was quite a blow to my ego as I thought I had a fairly high pain tolerance. Then as a test he forced my knee to bend back towards my chest and held it there for a count of ten. Quite possibly the most painful 10 seconds I’ve ever experienced as I felt little tears run down my face. His response was “See, you didn’t yell the roof down. You need to do this to yourself every day and get this knee moving”. I guess it was some tough love and the start of a couple of months of daily pain I need to work through. Never ask a surgeon for some compassion! The good part of seeing the surgeon was that he was very satisfied with his handy work and convinced me that I’ll be up and running with a brand new knee once it has all healed. Sweet!
I have just finished a block of bi-weekly visits to my amazing physio and now down to just weekly. These sessions have been far from ‘fun’ as the primary goal has been to get full movement back into my knee. If you live in Ashburton you may have heard my cries of pain! I still have some internal muscle and bone bruising from the operation which restricts full flexion of my knee, and this is where physiotherapy is necessary to get back to full function and also break up scar tissue. In fact, before each session I take pain killers to be able to get through it. I put the pain all in perspective when I look at my x-ray and see what trauma my knee went through. Bone drilling into my femur and screws in my patella are the more obvious ones, not to mention cut nerves and tendons.
The recovery process has certainly taken its toll on me both mentally and physically, mostly due to lack of sleep. Only now have I started sleeping through the whole night without being woken up by my aching knee. Perhaps now I have some idea of what a new Mum might feel!
Rehab exercises consist of a lot of water running, stretching, foam rolling, and muscle activations. Gradually I can see my quads and calves returning as I’m able to stimulate them with the many exercises prescribed from my physio.
Day to day is about setting small goals to stay focused on my rehab. Ticking the boxes of these little landmarks gives me a sense of achievement and that I’m heading in the right direction. So far I have succeeded in: ditching the crutches, driving my car, returning to work, riding a spin bike, walking without a limp, improving my degree of flexion at each physio session, doing some body weight squats, and having a whole night of uninterrupted sleep (finally)! I managed to tick off one of my biggest goals on the weekend when I finally got to ride my bike back on the road again and cruise along with my bike buddies. This was my most satisfying accomplishment so far and has given me a big boost in confidence.
My next goals are to: be able to grab my leg to do a standing quad stretch, do a lunge, a single leg calf raise in full, some weighted squats, ride some hills, reach 100km in a single ride, and complete my cycling holiday from Amsterdam to Bruges in July. So I still have a lot of work to do. Then after those goals are checked, it will be time to run again. Something I haven’t been able to do properly now for 16 months. That will be the big test to measure the success of this journey. Bring it on.
