Week 5-6

Week 5

Life continues to get to normal. The CRACKLY phase everyone warned me about (where everything pops and clicks and freaks you out) seems to have only been 2 days… or maybe it has not hit fully. We will see.

  • Get up around 6:30am when the kids do, listen to them getting around for school, and at some point make it to my home office and do some emails, blog, etc as long as I can. Each day got better – 90-120min is all I should do before I get up to do something else – anything else. However, I CAN do more, I just find I pay for it later so I find excuses to get up. Or just drink a ton of water and that forces it!
  • Do PT exercises on the bed
    • on tummy, squeeze lower abs, glutes and flex feet for 5 seconds. Do not engage anything else. Must be able to breathe. 30x
    • while sitting squeeze lower abs and glutes for 5 seconds. Must be able to breathe. 20x
    • Rock back and forth on hands and knees – 30x
    • on stomach engage my mutifidus – 3x20x
    • Squeeze a ball in between legs and also use a band to squeeze OUT while doing a bridge – 20x
    • Left leg fall outs – 30x
    • Rotations of my hip on a swivel chair – 20x
    • Assisted little circles of my hip 10 min – down to 2x
  • Get on bike 15min no resistance 2x/day

PRO TIP: I have rigged up my own ice situation and it helps overnight. Put a heavy duty ice pack in between me and the chair leg and then put a frozen water bottle between the ice pack and the chair. This keeps the ice pack cold all not, but NOT VERY COLD. This is important, because you cannot leave a normal ice pack against you more than 20-30min (depends on the temp and your skin tolerance). This method allows the ice pack to remain COOL all night without being freezing cold. Works great!

All in all, this week was pretty boring. I do not FEEL bad, although I am sleeping like crap still, I am still experimenting. Whether it is the body, the recliner I am still sleeping in, or what – does not matter, sleep is broken and usually not enough.

Oh yeah, and the cubs won the world series for the first time in 108 years!

I only did 1 set of 2 PT last week – the first lapse in 5 weeks. Ticked me off, the day just got away from me. I was stiff too – my body noticed. I was sore on the outer hip.

Week 6

Life continues to get to normal. I am going out more and more, doing more and more independently, but just forcing myself to continue to BE GOOD. I think I say to myself, dozens of times a day, DO NOT SCREW THIS UP! I have to stay for the long haul and maintain my ability to follow directions. 

  • Get up around 6:30am when the kids do, listen to them getting around for school, and at some point make it to my home office and do some emails, blog, etc as long as I can. Each day got better – 90-120min is all I should do before I get up to do something else – anything else. However, I CAN do more, I just find I pay for it later so I find excuses to get up. Or just drink a ton of water and that forces it!
  • Do PT exercises on the bed
    • on tummy, squeeze lower abs, glutes and flex feet for 5 seconds. Do not engage anything else. Must be able to breathe. 30x
    • Rock back and forth on hands and knees – 30x
    • hands and knees and engage my mutifidus – 30x
    • Squeeze a ball in between legs and also use a band to squeeze OUT while doing a bridge – 20x
    • Left leg fall outs – 30x
    • Rotations of my hip on a swivel chair – 20x
    • Assisted little circles of my hip 10 min – down to 2x
  • Get on bike 15min no resistance 2x/day

This week I was able to stop napping during the week. As much as I would have loved to, it was no longer absolutely mandatory, so I stopped.

I have substantially added to the amount of stairs I am doing, but for the most part I am still avoiding them.

I had a Dr appointment downtown for another matter and ended up cancelling. Realizing HOW FAR I would have to go once I parked, probably over a mile EACH WAY, on crutches, just wasn’t going to happen. With my normal crutches it puts the wrists in an odd position and being as heavy as I am (246 and holding strong) there was no way. I have been would have completely irritated my wrists.  Now, if I did not have my brace and could use the Mobilegs then it might have been ok – but barely. But I cancelled

1-pair-of-mobilegs-ultra

Oh yeah, there was an election this year. Wow. Donald Trump won, and not by a little, by a lot (even though Hillary won the popular vote, by a small margin – 211,000 votes)

6 week checkup! My workout schedule from my coach:

burn

The day I have been waiting for!!!!

Saw the Doc. Healing is coming along perfectly and they are pleased with my progress. The fact I have virtually no pain, the discomfort sitting is going away, the feeling is returning to my foot/groin, all are where it should be.

NO MORE BRACE. Soon as they he said that…

burn

However, I am NOT off crutches yet. They need me to wean off them:

  1. 2 days, full weight, but using 2 crutches. If no major issues with body…
  2. 2 days, full weight, ONE crutch on non-op side (which is going to be weird). If no major issues with body…
  3. 2 days, full weight, bring a cane or crutch in case

I said I brought my goggles so I can swim right???

 

Minolta DSC

Nope.  2 MORE weeks. Apparently, during this weaning off period I am a high fall risk and they do not want me on the swim deck with crutches and/or until I want walk like a normal person So…. 2 more weeks.

BOOO. Seriously not happy. They have really NOT done well managing my expectations. I asked before surgery and at every followup when I could swim and the answer just gets longer every time I ask. If they would have told me NO swimming for 8 weeks or whatever, that would have been fine. But having a new answer every visit is discouraging because I have been REALLY good and REALLY patient and I will continue to be – but changing the finish line just isn’t fair, or nice.

6 weeks down, 24 weeks to go before full release. Good God, that seems like a long time. 18.75% of the way there. I will get there, I will be patient. I will do as told. Honestly, it is the only option. I am not about to screw up endurance athletics for the balance of my life just because I cannot wait 24 more freaking weeks.

Stay strong peeps. It is a long journey and if you cannot be patient you are screwed.

After I left and got home I started practicing walking. It isn’t bad at all. Going 20-50ft at a time, no issues at all. Will go outside and walk down the sidewalk and see how that goes. Other than that, just walking around the house monitoring how it feels.

The story is to be continued here… Weeks 7-8.

%d bloggers like this: