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10 Days Post Op.....so far, so good

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@mbrown it's great to hear your pain is being managed so well with the Percocet mix - I know that is my preferred medicine and what the dr will send me home with (hoping for a high dose since it barely managed my pain after a scope in 2015)

Regarding the Meloxicam - I've taken it for over 1 1/2 years (praying my insides didn't get messed up) and when it was stopped last week, I didn't notice a major change in my pain. I thought, dang, why was I even taking it Tylenol arthritis helps me so I switched to taking it. Looking ahead to the day I don't have to take any of it a year or so from now :)
 
Day 4 update - today was a good day. Pain has been very much under control all day. Had 1 pill at 5:30 am, another at 7:30 am (before therapy), another at 12:30 and another at about 6:00. Had my first day of outpatient rehab this morning and it went well. Nothing really hurt any more than it should have and PT didn't push hard. I did what they told me to do but everything felt ok. Iced both knees to finish session. (My scoped knee feels fantastic......already better than before surgery).

Came home and spent the rest of the day on CPM Machine, icing, with another round of very light PT at home and icing again as I type. Trying to be super attentive to what my body is telling me and so far it seems to be cooperating with what I am doing. Hope this continues. Only 4 days in, but so far I'm very pleased with where I am and pain and swelling has been much less than I had anticipated.

The clicking is the only thing that has me baffled. I know everyone says it's normal, but it just feels like my old joint when it felt like it was going to come out of joint or something. Is this the actual new joint that is clicking or is it soft tissue and/or tendons that are trying to find their new place?

[Bonesmart.org] 10 Days Post Op.....so far, so good
 
Wow! Your TKR is hardly swollen! I hope it stays that way. Is the wrap on your right leg Velcro?
 
mbrown said:
The clicking is the only thing that has me baffled. I know everyone says it's normal, but it just feels like my old joint when it felt like it was going to come out of joint or something. Is this the actual new joint that is clicking or is it soft tissue and/or tendons that are trying to find their new place?
Click to expand...
The clicking happens because, instead of the relatively softer bone and cartilage you used to have, you now have hard metal and plastic parts moving over one another.
Clicking/clunking knee joint after surgery
 
@KarriB, yes its an ace bandage with a Velcro strip. And yes, I hope it stays that way also. I think it's the gameready machine.
 
@Cats......I looked up gams in the urban dictionary and this is what it said. AMP - gams. A nice, long pair of female legs . Ashley has a stately pair of gams.
 
@RMasano, I'm just taking it one day at a time. Definitely pleased with where I am today but such a long journey ahead and I know there will be ups and downs. Right now I'm just bored. Need some more company over here!
 
Can't believe how little swelling there is. You're off to a great start!
 
I wonder what day 6 will bring? Slept in the recliner again from about 11:30-5:30. Yesterday was able to go back into a deep sleep from 6-7:15. That's the reason I picked up my phone and started typing, because that often will make me sleepy.

Good football on today, but I'm afraid that today is really when I'm gonna get a full dose of stir crazy. Although, between a couple of sessions of light therapy, a couple of sessions of CPM and then ice/gameready machine I've eaten a lot of time. Still think I'm gonna be really bored today. I'm gonna have to commit to trying to read some today. If nothing else maybe it will make me sleepy.

Haven't had too many daytime naps yet that were longer than just a couple of minutes. I'll get drowsy and drift off for a couple of minutes and then bam, wide awake. Probably ADD.

I feel like scope knee is really close to 100%. TKR knee feels pretty good when I woke up. Hopefully will be able to do some therapy and still keep it happy. Haven't had any pain meds in almost 7 hours, as I've gotten to where I really don't need to wake up in the night to take them.

I'm just bored and rambling now (and not sleepy.......gggrrrrr) so I'll go for now.

(When this is all over with and I go back and re-read my posts a year from now......I'm gonna think a crazy person wrote it
 
Oh wait, I did actually have a question.......my flexion is just over 90 sitting in a chair but it's about 80 lying on my back doing heel slides. Does that make my flexion 80 degrees or 90 degrees? (What's standard position to measure)?
 
I always felt it was harder to measure while laying down. In the end it doesn't matter as long as you're able to do the things you want.

Boredom was the pits for me. Visits from friends, family and then after a month a meal out or visit to a friend's house helped. I always made sure my leg was propped up though, even at a restaurant. Since you're down south, you may be able to take a walk outside after the first few weeks.
 
@mbrown YIKES! Didn't mean you had girly legs. Just meant they were looking good.

Binge watch some Netflix. If the weather is good for it, get outside for a few mins for fresh air. Play Trivia Crack or Words with Friends...
 
@cats, ha!! I knew you didn't mean it that way. Today is football watching day. Tomorrow will begin the Netflix binge watching. I'm trying to space it out and take advantage of bowl week. What's your trivia crack username?

@karri yeah on the ROM, I was just wondering if there was a standard to measure by just to make sure I'm talking apples to apples. Do you think it's normal that I have 10 more degrees sitting in a chair or table than I do lying on my back? I know what ultimately matters is whether or not I can do the things I want to do, and I'm not gonna obsess over ROM but it does give me a goal and something to measure and shoot for.

Feeling good at the moment. Had a really good therapy session now drinking coffee, watching College Gameday and hooked up to the Gameready Machine. Things could be worse in the world of post TKR rehab
 
Yes, it typical to have better numbers while sitting, after all you have gravity working in your favor.
 
mbrown - First let me just fawn over how amazingly great your leg looks post tkr! So little swelling and already a normal shape! It's like the Miss America of tkr knees! :eyebrows: ha ha! (just thought I'd stick with the 'gams' theme!)

In all honesty, it appears we have some similar knee issues, and my left knee is probably in store for a tkr in 3-5 years also. Although at this point, I have politely refused any scope procedures, as it feels and sounds exactly like my right knee did about 5 years ago. BTW - on the post op ROM, I also have about a 10 degree difference in the sitting vs lying down leg slides. I say go with the better number... I mean, it shouldn't matter what position you were in as long as you got there, right? I'm ashamed of how many positions I've contorted myself into just to see if I can find a more comfortable way to do heel slides. My mom is 5ft,and can't touch the floor when sitting in a normal chair, so her PT has her 'walking' her legs down the wall while she is upside down in bed LOL :spin: Probably a good thing we don't have hidden cameras in our rooms!

I bet I would like your wife.... I, too, tend to be on the 'sensitive' side. Just let her know she is appreciated, and it will all be good. We're easy like that LOL. I know what you mean, though, about hating to ask for things. I want to be able to do for myself - but moreso, I really dislike being a burden. Nothing like watching someone do all of your regular chores for the day, plus their own, go to work, and then having to ask for a laundry list of things like 'more ice please' or 'can you wrap my leg for the shower'? Luckily, my hubby has just as many ortho problems as I do, so I figure it will all even out in the end.

Here's to hoping you continue to have such a stellar recovery :beer:

Liz
 
@liz thanks for the encouragement......."like the Miss America of TKR knees"......LMAO. You and Cats are gonna give me a complex. [emoji23]. That said, I could just be lucky but I also feel like the Gameready Machine (or some other cryotherapy machine with cold and compression) has been a huge factor. I'm a big, big believer in cryotherapy

Does your "good" knee give you a lot of trouble? I agree with you, if it's just early arthritic pain I wouldn't mess with it but if you have torn your meniscus then you might do yourself a favor to get it fixed. In my case, it was much different than my arthritic pain so I knew I had something torn in there. My "good" knee had gotten more painful than my bad knee. I've been able to operate for a while now with one bad wheel but two is tough to work around.

Sounds like your mom has a great PT. That's hilarious.

Remind me again when your surgery date was?
 
Josephine had a diagram to illustrate how ROM is to be measure. Of course I can't find it now.

Measuring on the bed yields wildly varying results.. lumpy mattress. Better on a hard surface. Thats what PT told me.
 
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