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TKR Getting my Life back on May 1

Good on you for choosing not to worry. Gosh, how wonderful to have easy pool access! Providing you move gently, being in the water may help reduce the swelling.
 
Well, bad me. I think I overdid a bit yesterday -- shopping with daughter in the morning, pool in the afternoon and little time for icing and elevating all day. I paid for it last night with a bad night's sleep and am still paying today with soreness and pain. Icing and elevating and not overdoing are the words for the day.

Roxie
 
Kansas Teacher said:
Well, bad me. I think I overdid a bit yesterday -- shopping with daughter in the morning, pool in the afternoon and little time for icing and elevating all day. I paid for it last night with a bad night's sleep and am still paying today with soreness and pain. Icing and elevating and not overdoing are the words for the day.

Roxie
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Not to worry---we have all been members of the ODIC. What will eventually happen, though, is that all of this will come together and you will have to drop out of the ODIC---you will not be able to overdo anything to your knee.

Other body parts may shriek and howl, but your knee will get along just fine.
 
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Amazing thing, @referee54 , other than that sore area I perpetually whine and obsess about, the knee held up pretty well. It was mostly muscles around it that hurt.
 
I can tell my leg is getting stronger. Early on, if I stood at the sink to brush my teeth or wash my face, my leg hurt and cramped up pretty quickly. Now I feel pretty comfortable even though when I go from a having my leg completely straight to bending it -- or vice versa -- it's kind of stiff and hurts for a bit until I get going. From what I've read, that's pretty typical this early on and it does seem somewhat better than it did a couple weeks ago. Such a journey this recovery is! Now I notice my tibia is a bit sore. It seems like when one thing starts to feel better, another starts to hurt. But I'm going with @PolarBear60 's philosophy. When the pain moves or changes, something is healing!

Still the tight band feeling but it really hasn't impeded my ROM so I have just accepted that it is part of the healing process and can live with it until it finally decides to go away.

Roxie
 
If I have to stand, I'm more comfortable shifting my weight to my TKR knee. It feels more comfortable than putting the weight on my non-TRK knee.
 
I agree with @referee54, that strength and stamina takes time. My PT has me on heavy quad exercises that don't stress the knee. I am starting to see benefits in some areas. But you have to work both legs so you don't get an imbalance.
 
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I've been focusing on working both legs lately, @wberry . When I was in PT, he just had me work the TKR leg due to time constraints but stressed to me that I should work both legs on my own for that very reason. I got myself a floor peddler which was easy to bring along to Arizona and I have been doing 2 to 3 5-minute sessions on that spread over the day. It really loosens my knee up and I think my flexion has improved quite a bit by simply doing that.

Roxie
 
Hi Roxie

You're having a good recovery. I love your honesty about the ODIC. We all do it. We feel really good one day only to find out our knee isn't!!!

I've enjoyed reading through your thread xx well done xx

Love Ann x
 
Thanks @Nana moon 27 . I feel like we have to be honest on this forum and I'm sure I'll rejoin that club a few more times before it's all said and done. By the way, I love your name and would love to hear the story behind it. My 5-year-old grandson said to me today, "When you were a little girl, your name was Roxie. Then you grew up and it changed to Grammy." Made me smile!

We were gone a couple days taking our grandson over to a cabin in Flagstaff and I didn't have a chance to post. I could hardly find my thread tonight we have so many new people. Welcome to all of you -- you'll find this site so very helpful. We had a nice time with our grandson and took him to the Grand Canyon then, before we headed back today, went to a drive-through animal park called "Bearizona," which was actually very nice. I think he enjoyed that more than the Grand Canyon! We'll be here through the weekend then will start our trek home but plan to stop off in Colorado on the way and enjoy a break from the hot weather before returning to Kansas.

I'm still dealing with swelling and that tight band feeling although some days are better than others. At 8 1/2 weeks, I'd like to say it won't last too much longer but know that isn't necessarily the case. I do notice that areas of it are more puffy than others and I think it's because the swelling is receding in some places. I think when I get home to Wichita, I'll be close to far enough along that I may try some lymphatic massage and see if I can help the swelling along a bit that way. I know that the main solution is simply time but if I can speed things along at all……..

Roxie
 
Roxie, I wish we could speed things along!!! You seem to be doing so well on your trip. I got to get into a hot tub and pool last weekend and it was great. But, I think I am going to be a charter member of the ODIC. Every time I think I'm better I over do it and go backwards again. My pain right above the knee cap is worse again and so is the back of my knee. Even the tight band is tighter:headbang:.

The trip with your grandson sounds like fun but how was the driving around? I still have a hard time sitting for any length of time. Enjoy the rest of your trip!:flwrysmile:
 
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It's so easy to overdo it. You don't tend to realize until after the fact.

As to the impatience I've found sometimes looking back I can see when those little steps happened and it makes me feel better. And maybe that's because of my not so little step (MUA) yesterday!

sent from my Galaxy 4
 
sharalder said:
Roxie, I wish we could speed things along!!!
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We all have felt very much the same way.

We have to realize though, that a normal recovery is slower than we would like it to be.

In all honesty, very few of our forum members had a speedy recovery.

It may be longer than we would like it to be,but the end result is very much worth it!
 
You are all such honest people and that makes me feel so happy and hopeful as I head into these last two weeks of Pre-op. I know that the BTKR may be a bit harder to recover from since they will both be healing but I am so hopeful. When I read these open transparent reports it really does make me believe all will be well in the world.
@Kansas Teacher I love how your grandson asked you about your name...... I really believe that grandchildren are just gifts from God to make us thankful for everything. I got to see my little 10 mo. old last night for only a few minutes and he makes me smile and warms my heart so much!! He is so responsive and smiling ear to ear which just makes me thrilled to have him in our lives.
 
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@iivesfam5 , stay close to this forum. You will have issues crop up here and there along the way even with the smoothest of recoveries. In my case, I have always received the answer, reassurance, scolding, or information I needed. And truly, the scoldings were as valuable as the rest!
@sharalder , I have new aches and pains that seem to crop up all the time. I'm going with @PolarBear60 's thought that it means healing is taking place. As far as the trip goes, we get out every hour or hour and a half and walk around and do something -- that seems to help although I'm almost always stiff when I get out of the car until it loosens up.

@tigz , I am beyond happy that you have the procedure behind you and are looking forward to seeing pictures of you doing squats pretty soon!! Just kidding -- I know we're not supposed to do that. :)

@referee54 , thank you thank you for your honest but gentle reminders. You have been the constant reminder in my ear that I have needed and @wberry, if anyone gets the need for patience right now. It's you. Sigh, I hate that, my fellow Kansas friend.

Roxie
 
If you could find patience in a store---can you hear the clerk saying, "It is in aisle 7 near the common sense..." ----then this TKR recovery would be a "piece of cake", or as we say in baseball, a "can of corn."

However, it takes tough people to go through the recovery----and we have to find the patience within ourselves. It is there; we just do not know that we have it.

Every now and then, when we over do it, our knee or knees gently (or not-so-gently) remind us that we need to tweak the patience bit again.
 
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