Revision TKR Motherbone's Recovery Thread

I tried some over the counter iron supplements this week. I took them twice a day for a few days. I ended up with terrible diarrhea so I've scaled back to once a day. Hoping that will be more tolerable.
Self-medicating really isn't a good idea, as you've found out.
Unless you're anaemic, you don't need to take iron supplements.
 
@Motherbone I’m with you on wanting to get away from the walker. I don’t know about invisible though, I feel like I stick out. Like I have a neon sign over my head that says “watch out-old woman coming through “! I do know that I still need it. My PT said that I won’t be ready for the cane until I’m able to put all my weight on my operated leg without holding onto something. Right now I can’t do that.
 
I had the opposite reaction to iron pills, major constpation from day one. I had to start taking it 6 weeks before surgery and I forget how many weeks after. All the stool softeners and other attempts to offset it left a lot to be desired.
 
I wouldn't be doing supplements without the doctor's ok when you're going to be undergoing tests. You don't want to wind up masking the problem.
 
@Celle I am anemic and the lab tests for iron and ferritin indicated an iron deficiency anemia.
@kneeper I hear you, but my hair is falling out (and there's no history of baldness in my family), I'm tired all the time, and I just can't choke down enough liver to make a difference in my iron stores!
I'm only taking one 325 mg pill of ferrous sulfate once a day, which is probably not much more than that I could get in a multi vitamin with iron (which I wasn't taking, but now maybe I should temporarily). Stomach has been okay so far.
On a very happy note - I'm doing better with stair training, and today I drove my car around the neighborhood! At first I was just going to sit in the driver's seat and move my right leg back and forth between the gas pedal and the brake for practice. That turned out to be easier than I expected, so I backed the car down the driveway, again with no problems. I ended up taking my husband on a little drive up and down the blocks of our portion of the neighborhood. It will be so nice to be able to get up and go when I want to in the future, instead of having to wait for transportation to become available.
:hog:
 
Congrats on that success! Long time coming for you. No stopping you now!
:driver:
 
Great news about the driving! :happydance:
 
Congratulations the driving. It’s so freeing not to have to depend on someone for transportation.
 
I'm not saying you shouldn't take iron, just that your doc should be in the loop on what you're doing.
(I was a a bit anemic after my first tkr. But a couple of months later when I was still anemic it turns out it was from an NSAID caused ulcer.
 
I ended up taking my husband on a little drive up and down the blocks of our portion of the neighborhood.
Yay, freedom! That's what this surgery is for. My first alone drive I was so afraid that I pray almost constantly! God answered me and I soon lost my fear.
 
@Motherbone yay you’re driving!! I was planning on my first venture out this weekend, but we are having torrential rains here, so I decided to hold off.
 
Thanks to all for the well wishes! I drove to and from PT today. Getting into the car had been a concern but my replaced knee joint, even with its messed up patella, is still more functional than it was pre-op. I can bend it better and had no problems getting behind the wheel. Going down stairs is still a challenge. I got some tips from PT today about going down safely one stair at a time. I'm not sure when I'll be able to go up and down foot over foot. I did go up a few stairs on Friday. They were shallow and I took them one at a time.
 
At 2 years post op steps foot over foot are still a challenge for me. The shallower the better.

That’s great you drove to PT! For more than a year I struggled getting in and out of our Matrix on the driver side, though I did much better on the passenger side. We bought a CRV about a year ago and it’s a little higher and it’s easy to get in and out on the driver side. It must also have something to do with the position of the steering wheel.
 
Congratulations on driving, makes you feel like you’re getting your independence back!! Another step forward in recovery!!
 
I totally agree that the make of vehicle can determine whether one can get into it in the first place. We have a medium sized SUV and the height of the seats is just right for me to slide into, but some limb bending is needed in order to fold oneself into the seat and behind the wheel. I would have difficulty getting into my husband's big pickup truck and I don't think I could get into or out of a more low-slung sedan like some of my friends have.
 
Well, not much new to report; my recovery continues, albeit slowly. I work on strengthening the muscles of my legs, largely by ADL's around the house but also stretching and some focused exercises for my glutes and my right quad, which is still pretty weak. I'm beginning to think there might be some permanent damage there. I do some self-massage of the quad and find that often heat is more soothing than ice, particularly at the end of the day when my stiffness is at its worst. My back is a bit of a wreck in that I continue to have weakness and difficulty standing up straight; I'm incorporating some core exercises to try to turn it around. I would hate to have to see another orthopod for it!! I am driving more but not alone. My hubs is afraid for me to be in the car alone just yet. He's been as traumatized as I, just in a different way. I'm slowly tackling some tasks that were tabled or pushed aside by events of the past seven months -- like my annual well woman stuff, etc. Some of the clutter in the house is gradually being set right as well. I'm finding that time hangs heavy on my hands now that I'm past the more emergent and challenging parts of my injury but no longer going to work. I keep reminding myself that it's still early times and to just focus on getting stronger. On the sad-funny side - we were cleaning out the refrigerator this morning and found some yogurt dated October 2018, which means I bought it just before my surgery in mid September. Of course we threw it out, but it just shows how totally immersed and distracted we have been in the past seven months. I'm so glad spring is here. New beginnings.
 
I am down to PT every other week, with the sessions largely focused on pointers and tips to help me navigate activities of daily ambulation. I'm more proficient with the cane but if I'm outside on uneven ground, I wear my brace (aka "the beast") because it helps me stay stable. This week we dealt with my back problems in PT, which are limiting my ambulation, and after trying some of what was suggested, I have to say that for the first time with this practice, I don't agree with what they want me to do, so I won't be doing it 100%. It was suggested, for instance, that I do 3 sets of ten reps for my quads (for a total of 30) every day in order to aggressively strengthen that muscle. After 20 reps yesterday my knee was miserable so I stopped and I haven't picked it back up today. I'll probably do half of what she recommended; it's too much strain for a scarred kneecap to be riding up and down that much. She also did something called "psoas release" where she pressed on the inside of my pelvic bone, supposedly reaching the psoas to relieve tightness. I don't know about that. I looked up the anatomy and I'm not sure anyone can actually reach the psoas with their hands because it's a really deep muscle. Some yoga poses look more likely to help but heaven help me, there's no way I'll be able to get up if I manage to get myself down on the floor!!!

I drove to the hairdresser and the pharmacy this week, by myself (husband gulped deep breaths). No stopping me now. Going to work on solo grocery runs next.

I've dumped the shower stool that I had been propping my injured leg on. I'll have to sift through my previous posts to refresh my memory about when I started using it. Another milestone, able to sit on the shower bench with both feet on the floor and both knees bent at 90 degrees.
 
It's been quite wet here but I've been getting around. I don't have many places to go but I'm getting ready for more solo driving. I've pretty much let go of the walker unless I'm trying to balance something on it from one side of the house to the other; otherwise I'm relying on my cane. I need more balance work but my gait is getting better. I still have some instability in the injured knee. Not sure if that's going to fully resolve. I have a post op appointment in a month and will bring it up again. I'm seriously considering getting my left knee replaced sooner rather than later because of the problems my leg length discrepancy creates with my hips and back. That left knee is so valgus that it's functionally shorter than the now-straight but stiff right leg and I can't help but wonder if evening things up would help. Pain in the left knee also severely limits what I can do, and sometimes keeps me awake at night. If I do it this summer I will definitely approach the recovery differently, knowing what I know now! Unfortunately I seem to have developed bilateral carpal tunnel syndrome from all my reliance on upper body strength early on, and bracing my wrists has not relieved the symptoms, so I could be in for more orthopedic interventions in the future. Honestly, it seems to never end!!! :hairpulling: Hope everyone's doing well!
 
Two steps forward, one step back -- sigh. After a PT session last week I was fine until later that night when I began to have pain in my left ankle. This is not the side of my TKR, which was on the right, but as I've mentioned before, my left leg has bad length discrepancies with a lot of valgus distortion at the knee. Over the past week the pain initially progressed to the point where I was barely able to walk. I've stayed off my feet as much as possible and it seems to be lessening a little in the past two days. I don't know what I did, there was no sudden moment of injury and all I can figure is that the left leg, which has had to do double duty while my right kneecap healed, has finally had enough. I have a follow up appointment with my orthopedic surgeon in two weeks. I'm hoping the trajectory of improvement will continue but if not I suppose I will have to try to get in sooner. My PT session was about balance and I may have stressed the ankle with the exercises, which involved weight shifts and balancing for short periods of time while holding on to something. However, there was no pain during the session or immediately afterwards. So far my operated right leg has been able to take up the slack but I'm mindful of not overstressing anything these days.
 

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