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THR Cats land on their feet

Round 2 complete. Surgeon said everything went perfectly. Healing good so far. One night in the hospital just in case.
This one hurts a lot more. Surgeon said because this is the side that did all the compensating, it was much harder to move the muscles to get at the joint.
I am now in my comfy chair with my ice in my lovely quiet house eager for a nap.
 
Welcome back to the healing side.
More pain, but more baseline strength for recovery!
 
Congrats on, Lefty, and Happy Three Month Anniversary, Righty!
Hope your pain is well managed and you're able to rest comfortably.
Keep us posted!
@luvcats
 
Yesterday when we finally returned from the hospital (after several rounds of hurry up and wait) I went through my bedroom on my way to the loo and it was so cool and quiet all I could think of was bed. It was way too early, but the lure was considerable. Sleep in the hospital? Surely you gest. Someone on my hallway was... displeased with her pain management and quite vocal about it, yelling for nurses rather than using the call button. It was loud and stressful.

Husband says I am doing much better than the first day of round one. I think maybe it isn't so much that the pain is more, but my in hospital pain management was less. When I went in for righty, I was on quite a considerable dose of tramadol as maintenance for long term pain management. Now that I am at home, I've added some of that back in and things are much more tolerable.

Husband notices I am much more self sufficient in getting out of my chair, in refilling my ice water and changing my ice packs. And now that he has reattached the basket to my walker and pulled up the standing mats off the kitchen floor, I'll mostly be able to manage my own food.

I think it makes a big difference that I had 2 months off the cane to relearn balance and to strengthen my right leg. It isn't quite strong enough, standing mostly on it during a shower, I'm shaky by the time I'm done, but it's doable.

I slept well. I am napping well. I am delighted that 'normal bathroom business' has resumed promptly.
 
As some people do report unexpected dizziness or faintness - with resulting loss of balance - during the first three days post op, I encourage you to reconsider standing in the shower quite yet.
 
luvcats said:
Husband notices I am much more self sufficient in getting out of my chair, in refilling my ice water and changing my ice packs. And now that he has reattached the basket to my walker and pulled up the standing mats off the kitchen floor, I'll mostly be able to manage my own food.
Click to expand...
My husband also noticed that I was more independent fairly quickly. I think the pain was the same but I knew how to do everything to manage my day. This gave me more energy to take care of myself. I am 4 months past my second hip and feel great. I still tire after a busy day, but am 10 times better overall than last year this time. I hope it continues to go well for you.
 
Despite my many surgeries, I have never owned a shower chair. What I do have is a 4 prong cane that I take in with me for support. And several suction grab bars. I am not concerned about falling.
We are very anti-fall in this house.

Today was a long day of mostly dozing in my recliner. Watching a bit of olympics. A proper do-nothing day

Watching the bruises come out on my hand and arm. I blew through 2 ivs during the course of surgery. I don't actually know what happened, but the spot in my forearm where the iv was when I went in has a nice bruise, when I woke up the iv was in my other hand, and I came out of anesthesia wondering why my first hand hand hurt so much! There was a large lump and today the bruising color is really showing.

My temperature is rising. That is completely normal, but I know I'll feel less well for the next few days.
 
You have experience on your side so you now know what to expect & even though each recovery is different you will be able to manage the challenges.
Keep us posted!
 
@luvcats so happy to hear you're feeling more self sufficient and can manage some of the daily things on your own. I know I always hate that feeling of helplessness right after surgery. A proper do nothing day is definitely a must. Maybe try putting a little bit of ice on those bruises from the IV and see if that might help.
 
Day 4
Pain levels have dramatically improved just since yesterday. Today when I woke up and my meds had all expired and I had to figure out how to get out of bed...It wasn't too bad. I know things will improve rapidly from here. Yay!

That being the case, I expect today Il will become bored. I really need some solid social interaction, but I'm not sure it is available to me today.

Off to see about queuing up a good movie to distract me.
We watched the latest ghostbusters yesterday. It was pretty awful in our opinion.
 
Have fun deciding what to watch! This is a great time to watch movies with sequels or binge watch a television series. Happy Sunday!
 
@luvcats If you have Amazon Prime check out a movie called "Thelma". I haven't watched it yet but a friend said it was hilarious. Story - 93yo gal takes on scammers to get her money back.
 
Congrats on hip #2! Appears you are headed in the right direction! I’m sure it’s a relief to have the replacement completed!!
 
1 week!

I've still had more pain than expected. I'm going to talk to the doctor about adjusting my meds a bit when I see him Monday.

I am having a really annoying accessibility issue. My appetite gets weird after surgery, and I have a bunch of food allergies, so even at the best of times, my options are somewhat limited. After the first surgery, for a week or 2, I just did a bunch of take out supplemented with very simple things like pre done hard boiled eggs, ham, easy things like that.
This time of year, the biggest classic car show in the US happens in NV. This week. And most of last week. So every restaurant is filled to capacity, and a lot of the places I can eat are not doing delivery.
It has been very frustrating.

My multiple IV bruises look really awful and my hand still hurts. I'm glad I'm not really doing much with them.

Going along fine.
 
Usual suggestion for IV site bruising is warm moist heat. Many of us find arnica gel helps resolve bruising more quickly (when I was going to a lot of martial arts seminars I threatened to buy an industrial size 55 gal drum of it :heehee: ).
 
Happy One Week Anniversary, luvcats! Hopefully you get the meds adjusted and pain under control soon and find some nutrition that is safe for your dietary needs while still fulfilling. :fingersx:
Thankfully you feel things are fine overall. Have a great Thursday and weekend! :)
@luvcats
 
When I had my knees done serially, it was one in July, the other in September. In retrospect, I think it was helpful that I never felt all the way better. It made for a very long summer, but it kept me very focused on where I was in recovery.

Yesterday I had a serious case of the fidgets and couldn't sit still. Oh yeah, it's as bad as you think.
It didn't feel like all that much, but it's hard to remember that a week ago I was set back to square 1. Today I am not only in the ODIC, but I'm on the naughty chair I think. Icing and taking maximum meds will be the order of the day.

I did get quite a lot of knitting done yesterday. It wasn't all browning meat and washing up.
 
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