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THR I am titanium!

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I am still not sleeping well at night. I had one 4 hour stretch one night last week, but then I was back to fitful sleep, waking every one to two hours. The problem is my leg. It just aches and aches from my groin down to the instep of my foot despite pain medication. I guess maybe I need to take an even higher dose before bed. It's very aggravating. Last night I had the added pleasure of all these weird aches on my outer calf that also woke me continuously. They chose to strike in various areas of my calf. I think part of the problem may be that I never fully fall asleep because I am trying to fall asleep with my leg aching. I also still have pain at the site of my epidural. Does anyone else have this nearly 4 weeks out?

On a positive, my hip swelling has continued to decrease. My right side now almost matches the left. I am still not brave enough to try on a pair of snug fitting jeans however. I think I will continue with my lounge pants. ;) They are a hybrid between a sweat pant and pajama bottom, but nice enough looking to wear out and about. I am not sure if lounge pant is the correct terminology, but it is what I call them because they are quite comfortable to lounge in. :D
 
It's funny.... I get those calf aches too! I'm at 5 weeks today and they are not as bad as a few weeks ago. My biggest 'pain' is still in my glute on the op-side.

I can dig the lounge pants :-)


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inthebeginning what is up with the calf situation!? Woke me up form a dead sleep and jumped all around my calf...LOL!

ETA. I have the glute thing going on too. I could not even do clams last week because it was too painful. It seems better this week.
 
Hi calikat I lived in lounge pants or as we call them over here track suit trousers for weeks after my surgery as they are comfortable and easier to get on and off without breaking the restrictions.I see you had an anterior so don't have many restrictions.You will get back into your skinny jeans again before you know it.
 
calikat said:
I guess maybe I need to take an even higher dose before bed.
Click to expand...
Yup! You see, this pain almost always gets worse at night because, when we lay down, all our body fluid evens out like a half full bottle laid on its side. So your hips swells more and if you remember what I said before, swelling = pain! So ..... take more pain meds.
calikat said:
Does anyone else have this nearly 4 weeks out?
Click to expand...
It can happen any time, even up to 8-10 weeks out.
 
calikat - just popping in to say I'm so sorry about your sleepless painful nights! I was about to complain about mine - but I'm only one week out, and Josephine had a wonderful explanation (see, I had two good nights, then last night hurt worse than ever - but I probably had not taken enough pain meds before bed).

So thank you Josephine for the explanation!

Anyway, just wanted to say I hope your nights become better REALLY soon! :flwrysmile:
 
Josephine Jamie I woke up with one of my back teeth aching. I am now terrified about an infection. I sometimes have tooth pain because of grinding my teeth. In fact most of my molars have root canals because of it. I have some leftover amoxicillin. Should I start taking it until I can get to the dentist? Just one more thing to worry about. :(. I am scared to death I may have an abscess or some other dreaded thing.
 
No, no - do calm down! There is absolutely no real evidence that periprosthetic infections arise from dental or any other infection. You said yourself that you grind your teeth and this is more than likely the cause of the toothache. Read these to see how I can say this with conviction
Evidence insufficient to recommend prophylactic antibiotics for dental procedures
Infection: peri-prosthetic infection - also known as late onset infection
Infection: Periprosthetic infection

There are also heaps of other reasons for toothache that have nothing to do with infection, so you should never take antibiotics without a doctor prescribing them. That's how this world ended up with MRSA.
 
Thank you so much Josephine. As you have probably guessed I am somewhat high strung. ;) I am going to call my dentist when his office opens to get things checked out...it is only 7:39 am here and things are not open yet. But it is a relief to read those articles. Everything I read online has made me fearful of all things dental.
 
Josephine I am still a bit confused. The one article says that an abscess does dump a bacterial lode into your blood stream in the first few hours. Well I am hoping it is not an abscess. It is concerning to me that the tooth was hurting despite the pain medication I am taking for my hip. Breathe and stay calm. My self talk mantra. ;)
 
Yes, that's what was always thought for years and years but there was noevidence to support it, just supposition. That's why the first article is so crucial. That was released earlier this year from recent studies. There are still many websites online which are not only old but the authors are ill-informed. So don't read them. What I have told you is bang up to date. You can take it to the bank.

Oh, and you might still find doctors and dentists who are not up to date and still think the old guess-work is right. So you may find when you ring your dentist that s/he starts on about prophylactic antibiotics, but don't be scared and don't engage them in a debate about it but it's not your fault they are ill-informed about it. Personally I wouldn't take them but if you feel better complying then do so. But there's really no need.

As regards pain killers, dental pain is a bit like arthritis, there is no pain killer that will get on top of it. Ask anyone - nothing works, even if it's just an exposed cavity.
 
Let me also tell you NOT to worry about that tooth pain. See your dentist and my guess is it's from the grinding that you say is a problem sometimes.

I had my second TKR last March. Unknown to me, I had a dental abcess that didn't show on the xray when I had my pre-op check. One of my teeth was doing something they call "resorption" which means the tooth was basically destroying itself. A few months after my TKR, that tooth became uncomfortable and I could tell there was something rough like a cavity at the root of it. I was a bit scared (like you) about the prospect of infection, but waited until my 6 week check with the surgeon to be sure I could have dental work done. He cleared me to see the dentist and that's when they found the resorption problem. I ended up having a root canal and crown. There was actually a fairly good size pus pocket at the base of the root that was a devil to get out (that's another story!). As a precaution, my dentist prescribed a course of antibiotics for the week surrounding the root canal procedure. But I'm here to say that all went very well in the end and there were no problems even though there was obviously an infected tooth.

So....caution and questioning is good.....worrying and fearing an infected prosthesis because of a dental problem is not.
 
Hello Jamie. Thank you for answering. I saw your post this morning while scouring BS for tooth related problems. I so appreciate your taking the time to answer. My endodontist could not find any problems...no evident infection and he has those high tech X-rays. He did find that my bite is off which is probably causing some of the discomfort. It pretty much goes away after I wake up and get moving...LOL...Kind of like my hip...although the hip pain does not go away completely. I now have to go see my regular dentist and have my bite adjusted and a new night guard made. Those things are crazy expensive, but what are you going to do.

As an aside, I took two ibuprofen this morning since I completed my regimen of aspirin. I cannot believe how much better my hip feels using an NSAID. It's amazing!
 
calikat, I read your thread and you have had a really hard time. Now that a
month has gone by, I hope you're feeling much better. It's a slow recovery even when it goes well. I had pain in the front of my thigh up till about the 7 month mark. It's worth it, I promise. XO
 
Hello BarbaraR! Thanks for the visit. That is good to know about the thigh. Did yours feel like someone had taken a hammer to it also? LOL. I had my best day pain wise so far. I think the ibuprofen I took in the morning helped a lot. I have to be careful not to do too much under the illusion of being fairly pain free, but it was a very nice reprieve. I am going to take another dose tonight before I go to bed and see if I sleep any better.
 
BarbaraR I borrowed it from the song. It seemed appropriate since my hip now has titanium components. ;) Thanks for the support. <3. I am hopeful to tho back to yoga some day. I had been practicing Bikram, but I do believe it actually may have made my hip worse. Every time I would take a class I would suffer with radiating pain down my inner thigh, The real truth probably is just that my hip was done.
 
Hi calikat - I'm sorry it's been so rough for you. :sad: I totally empathize with it all!

I wanted to add I used to love yoga as well - but last year, I took a "gentle yoga" class because my joint pain (rheumatoid arthritis) was really starting to get to me, and I thought it would help. It was me (43) and everyone else was over 60. They all left me in the dust, lol. :snork: It was after about 4 of those classes that my hips started REALLY, REALLY hurting. I mean the damage was already done, but something about that class, "gentle" or not, seemed to make things far worse. Oh, the irony....:umm:

Anyway, I do hope to one day return to yoga - because way before my joint problems, I loved it.

I hope one day you are able to return to it as well!

Wishing you a wonderful evening....:flwrysmile:
 
LeoRuby very sorry to hear about your RA. That is a tough one. It must make surgery much more complicated. Did you have to stop your medication regimen? It is ironic about the yoga. I had switched to yoga from aerobics etc...anything high impact. After 4 months of practice my right hip was unbearable. I think I may have pushed an already torn labrum over the edge. Oh well. My expectations of what I will be able to do activity wise has changed considerably. At this point I will be happy to just walk my dog, go to work, and be a functional human. :/
 
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