Post op- Day 6

Day 6

Another day of improvements. My ROM has increased yet again and I've managed to carry out all my usual exercises painlessly. So in terms of rehabbing, another successful day. But, another boring day. This has literally been my view:

So... bored.. I'm not a big movie person, so I've been watching old Metamoris fights on YouTube. I like little people Jiu Jitsu like Jeff Glover and Kristian Woodmansee. Those guys movement is soooo good. I've also been searching through Mackenzie Dern's Facebook and instagram, trying to work out when she had her patella tendon ACL replacement in an attempt to predict how soon I could be back on the matt. Stalker much? 

In additional all that excitement, I've been writing a diet plan. Here's an example of the sort of thing I have to look forward to if I'm to maintain/lose weight whilst I'm largely immobile:

Om nom nom

I get my diet/supplement advice from Crossfit Man (aka Chris Longley) from Crossfit Westcountry. Dude knows his stuff and I appreciate all the advice he gives to me, so I'll be following his advice on how I can maintain muscle mass and lose fat once I'm more mobile.

Exercises

3 x 15 knee flexion drills

3 x 5min knee hangs

3 x 10 straight leg raises

3 x 10 quad tensening drills

My phsyio sheet says to stop doing the straight leg raises when they become easy to do again, so I may do them tomorrow for the last time. Knee flexion was awesome again. I upped the 10 to 15 reps today, as they weren't causing me any issues. Knee hangs are feeling good, I need to remember to relax my glutes and my whole leg in order to really let me knee sink.

I attempted (ppfft, using that term real loosely) another exercise today. Lying on my front, and attempting to bend my leg back (ultimately so my feet can reach my butt). It was a foul experience. Super tight on my stitches. I'll have to ease slowly into that one, but I'm sure as hell not looking forward to it..

I've got my first Physio appointment and my GP checking my dressing booked for this Tuesday (6th May). Will be good to get some advice/recommendations regarding rehab exercises and what I need to do next.

Icing (30-40mins)

10am

12pm

3pm

7pm

Yeah, icing like crazy today. I think the reduction in swelling is what has made my knee flexion exercises easier, so I'm going to continue icing at least 4 times a day.

In terms on my walking progression; I'm still wobbly as hell. I'm a little gutted really, as I'd envisaged myself off crutches by day 7. Then again my nerve block didn't wear off until day 2. My walking technique is good (I'm not doing anything funky with my hip or relying on the crutches) but I still need them both. Weight bearing isn't painful, as I can stand still with no crutches with what feels like a 60:40 weight distribution just fine. But no such luck when it comes to walking. *Shrugs*. Might be a mental thing. I'll keep trying. Getting there slowly!

End.

Post op- Day 5

Day 5

So my tubey-grip tried to attack me last night. I woke up at 3am with my knee area hurting like hell, only to feel that my tubey grip had all rolled up and was digging in super right right above my knee. You know when you wear a pair of socks that are too tight around your ankle, and it digs in, and you get a good itch from it where it's gone all red? Well, it was like. Only, replace the satisfying itch with excruciating pain. I might start sleeping with it doubled over rather than tripled over. I fell back asleep again, s'all good.

I've taken some swelling pictures. I'm pretty impressed. There's not a lot of difference, from my biased perspective.

Swelling

I know, I know. You want a close up of these bad boys. Well here you go.

Still a bit squidgy

I am, however, legitimately concerned that I may have been beaten up by the surgeon and his team. My leg looks like a prop from The Walking Dead..

Corpse leg vs normal leg

EURGH. From this angle, my bad leg is definitely more swollen. Mainly in the calf and ankle though. It doesn't seem to bad looking down on it. On second thoughts, I have done such an unreliable photo. The picture of my bag leg was taken considerably closer to my leg than my right one. And I'm a freakin' scientist. How embarrassing. Anyway, I digress.. 

I've officially hit boredom today. The weather is too inconsistent to lie out in (I'm lying out in the sun for like, 7min intervals. It's hardly worth lowering myself into the sun lounger), my brother has just gone back to uni so I have nobody to bully, and I suck at PS3.

I'm about to write a diet plan so I a) avoid turning into a super fatty and b) can return to Jiu Jitsu just sucky, not fat and sucky. I eat pretty good on the whole (too many treats recently) but I know what works well for my body and how to lose the weight properly (I've lost about 40lbs since starting Jiu Jitsu). I'll have to keep doing bits and pieces like that to keep myself busy. I'm really hoping I'll be able too do a small upper body workout maybe tomorrow or the next day. I've bee feeling good today, so we'll see.

Exercises

3 x 10 Knee Flexion

3 x 5 mins knee hangs

3 x 10 straight leg raises

3 x 10 quad tensening thingies

My exercise regime has yet to change, as I'm following my rehab notes given to me when I was discharged from hospital. It says to do this stuff from day 1 to day 14. I'm booking a Physio appointment tomorrow sometime, so I guess I'll be doing the same thing until then. 

It's good because I can tell I'm getting better at them. I don't have to shout "Up! UP!" at my leg when doing straight leg raises anymore, and I only swear a little bit when I do the knee flexion drills (again, they felt really good today, maybe even reached a 110 bend)

I've been slacking on strengthening my quads. Which is stupid because one of the things I was worried about was having one hench leg and one chicken leg, yet I'm doing nothing about it. The exercise is to literally tense your quad. When I do that, I feel it over my entire knee cap. I just did it then, as I typed this. I'd rather stick pins in my eyes. It's foul. No thanks.

I'm waiting until I can weight bare better, then I've read that they start getting you to do baby squats. Maybe I should just man up and do the tensening drills though..

Knee hangs are fine again. Feeling like I can relax more, and really sink into them. Weeeee.

Here's a video of my knee flexion drills. I reckon I'm close to 110 degrees on them:

Icing (20-30mins)

10am

1pm

3pm

6pm

9pm

My best friend (the cryocuff) is serving me well still. Oh, that reminds me. I lied yesterday. I said I took no pain killers. It got to about 7pm and I felt really achey so I was persuaded to take them. Today I took some ibuprofen late morning, it's 4:30 as I type, so I may take some more at dinner. I guess they're antiinflammatory too. Bonus.

Technically today has been another success, I'm just feeling a little deflated. It's one thing being off work, but if I can't train/go to the gym/paddleboard/DOANYTHINGILIKE then what's the point? Man, I can't even carry anything anywhere. I roll my bottle of juice down the hallway as I make my way to the lounge. Winner.

Post op- Day 1

 DAY 1-

I slept good. No waking in night crying out in pain or anything. I needed to pee at 5:30, but that was it. Getting on and off the loo is a challenge though. I'm very grateful I had been practicing single leg squats before the surgery!

Check out my morning ROM;

Pretty good, huh? 

The yellow stuff is iodine. I'm not a filthy animal.

Rehab movements today:

4 x 15 knee flexion 

4 x 5min holds of passive knee stretch (knee hang)

3 x 10 Static quad tensing
3 x 5 Straight leg raises

Knee flexion. Skanky legs still covered in iodine.. 

My icing regime is as follows;

Icing for 20mins at 

• 8am
• 11am
• 3pm
• 6pm
• 9pm

As I mentioned in my previous post, the bandages around my leg are thick as hell right now. There's cotton wool and all sorts under there. So I'm not sure how much the ice is really helping with the swelling (or indeed, how much swelling there is, as I can't decipher swelling for bandage!).

I reckon I'm almost achieving a 90 degrees bend in my knee now (8pm).

Still trying to weight bear, but really struggling. I can stand up fine, but its 90:10 ratio of weight distribution right now. Very painful if I try to put any more weight down.

That's the only thing that causes discomfort. I'm on 400mg tablets of ibuprofen, and 500mg of Co-codamol and taking them throughout the day when it starts to ache a little. But that's all experienced so far, a dull ache. When doing my exercises later on, it got a little worse. But nothing like I'd imagined. On my (just this second made-up) pain-o-meter, I'd probably say I'm cruising along at a 3/4 today.

Swelling

At about 5pm I took off the bandages. I was icing my knee, and whilst the top of the bandages felt cold, when I put my fingers underneath it (passed all the layers and cotton wool), my knee felt really hot. I know how imperative icing is to the rehab process, so figured I'd take off the bandages, but keep it compressed with a super tight tuby grip. I could feel the coolness of the ice afterwards. I reckon I've made a good decision.

Played around with bearing a little more weight later on and managed to walk much better. I'll take photos and a little video of that tomorrow though.

That's all for day 1. Day 2 to follow tomorrow..

End.

ACL reconstruction- Day of Surgery

Surgery day- yaaay! Time for a new ACL.

After deciding I didn't like my birth one, I detached it in August last year after failing to sprawl properly on a double leg takedown (sidenote; wrestling hates me).

So I'm up and at the hospital for stupid o'clock. I was first on the list for surgery (wahoo!) which meant they chucked a gown at me, took a pee sample, and also gave me some of their own underwear to wear. Imagine, if you will, a shower cap with 2 holes in. And I'd worn my cookie monster pants especially. Dammit.

Some chick comes in and asks what leg I'm having done and draws "ACL and an arrow" on my left shin.

Pretty sure my ACL is a little higher up than that..

They ask all the usual questions, confirmed I was who they thought I was (about 8 times) and then I was off down to be cut open.

This was my first time receiving anaesaestehthia. I don't remember going to sleep. The nurses were all super friendly and were chatting away when I was told they were going to put me under.


I vaguely remember coming round and having the foggiest conversation with the surgeon. I asking him if I had any microfractures (something he said was unlikely, but the rehab to it involved being hooked up to some knee bending machine for 2 hours, 3 times a day for 6 WEEKS). I don't remember him answering me, but when I finally came round properly, the nurse who was there during this foggy conversation that no I didn't have any micro-fractures which was apparently followed by me fist punching the air and saying "yeaaaaahhhh" (awkward).

Kinda, not really come round yet

I then got wheeled to a recovery room where I was fed bourbons and custard cremes, how very British. Within half an hour or so I was wheeled off for an X- ray and then brought back again.

The Physio came round a while later and gave me some crutches and a knee brace that I have to wear for 6 weeks when moving around. She gave me an extensive list of exercises to do as well as information on how often I should be doing them.

*Note* the sexy compression sock and my loafers. Total trend setter.

I got a couple of packs of pills thrown at me and Mummy Shebeast was called to come and collect me. Putting my clothes back on was, interesting.

Once home I elevated and iced my knee. The dressing and wraps are pretty thick (they can come off after 48hours) so I'm not entirely sure much of the coldness is getting through. Regardless, I've set alarms on my phone to remind myself to ice it for 20mins every 2/3 hours, religiously.

Think that pretty much sums up my surgery day. Played a bit of Mortal Kombat when I got home. Dozed a bit. Ate some dinner as my appetite increased later in the day.

Day 1 to follow..

End.