Hey, Leigh, Glad you found the forum. I am a 67 year old woman who is used to taking care of everyone. I had both knees done at the same time about 8-9 months ago and came home from the hospital on the sixth day, would have come home on the fourth but needed transfusions and had an allergic reaction to the first one. Normally when you have both knees done they want you to go into a physical therapy inpatient facility but my OS felt I would be fine coming home. We live out in the boonies and have six dogs, one of which was new at the time as my husband and son had rescued a puppy off the freeway while I was in the hospital. I was using a walker the first week but still managed to do the laundry, take care of feeding the dogs, two of whom have to be cooked for. So I was, also, doing the cooking starting the second day I was home. My oldest son lives with us so I did have him here all the time for moral support and in case I got into a pickle but for the most part I did well. My husband had taken three weeks of family leave so he was here as well, however, I would have felt comfortable staying by myself. We don't have any stairs so that helped. I think it is something you will have to play by ear when the time comes. Is there someone near you could call if you felt you needed them? For the first few weeks you really are mostly just resting and taking care of yourself. When I tell you what I could do I don't want to mislead you, the meals I fixed were very simple and my son carried everything for me so I did no lifting. Between naps and doing the exercises you will need to do and icing and elevating your leg anything else you find you can do is just icing on the cake. I would advise against doing what I did, on days when I felt really good I did way too much and then paid for it for several days afterward. This is a major, major surgery. I had a hysterectomy in 1997 and this surgery makes that surgery in comparison seem like a tonsillectomy. The most important thing you can do is take good care of yourself while trying to stay as active as you can. I found that one hard to do, I either did too much or couldn't do enough cause I did too little. Try to remember that it takes a couple of weeks before you begin to see results. You will still have pain but it will be different and I thought better, at least I knew the end result would be I could have my life back soon. Everyone recuperates at a different pace, there is no formula that will tell you in advance how you are going to be. I thought that my age would make it harder for me than say someone in their 40's and I found that wasn't necessarily so. There were a lot of people who were a lot younger than I am who had a harder time than I did. The best thing that we all had going for us, or one of the top three was finding this site. The support from Jo and the others who had had surgery were incredible and I will never forget any of them. They were there at all hours of the day and night to answer questions and be supportive. I am sure I would have driven my OS and his office staff crazy had it not been for this site. I wish you luck with your surgery and will keep you in my prayers. I hope you continue to post here and will be sure to keep an eye out for your posts. Good luck. Rowdy PS. Don't let what anything I said discourage you, this surgery, literally, gave me back my life. After two years of incredible bone on bone pain and barely being able to walk I now can do just about anything I want to do and for the most part I am completely painfree. I think 99% of the people who have this surgery would tell you the same thing.