It's a year tomorrow that I had my right knee replaced. I can't thank everyone on Bone Smart enough. You all helped me realize what was normal and what was not. The timetable for healing was helpful. I am still sorry for those of us who had problems with their knees. My heart goes out to you.
I've said from the beginning that I'm a slow healer, and it's been true. However, I am happy with the results. I get little aches and pains, especially a stinging sensation, but I use and abuse my knee.
I had trouble gardening all last winter, but just put in a shade garden with three rhododendrons, hosta, and tons of other plants. I dragged mulch and manure bags. A little discomfort at night, but no biggie.
Yay!
I walk the dachshunds, and can do so for several blocks, but they don't need much. They have short legs. (I had a dog walker come mid-day until June because I couldn't manage our son's golden-doodle.
Before my knee replacement I had to plan shopping in a store. I would sit in the parking lot (wishing I had a handicapped sticker) and plan the shortest routes for things I needed.
Yesterday I went food shopping, and brought all the groceries up to our second floor apartment. (I had a guy come who can install a chair lift if we ever need it. Our 92 year old neighbor has them everywhere.) I admit to thinking about how much I'm buying and carrying up the stairs. I then went to a big box store and bought several bags of manure and grass seed. I went to Target and walked all over, returning something and buying staples for the house.
I thought about my knee. The cart I had with the manure would go crashing about and I find that heavy things are hard to manage with my knee, so stopping it required strength. But it was more just interesting than painful.
I walk without a limp and I'm so grateful. The most difficult thing for me was to recover my extension, and I worked hard to get it back. It was painful, but worth it.
The left knee: Ugh. Just like my right knee, I was fine one day and in agony the next.
I got worked up, saw three doctors. Two thought I had avascular necrosis again. That threw me for a loop. What the heck? When I finally saw Dr. Burke he did not think it was AVN. (That threw me for another loop!) He said I had lost all cartilage, the meniscus was a mess, but that I wasn't quite ready for a replacement. He wants me to put it off for as long as possible. He had me stop wearing the braces and gave me one shot of lidocaine and about a gallon of cortisone.
The pain in that knee was so intense it was like a loud noise. It took over my whole body. I was taking three 2.5 mg hydrocodone pills per day, just to function. (I cut 5 mg pills in half.) The night he gave me the injections was painful, but the next day everything was quiet. The pain that radiated from my knee to my hip was gone. I noticed what hurt in my right knee for the first time in months.
I then completely abused both knees. We moved to the second floor of our two family when the kids moved away for medical residency training. I had a tenant move in to the first floor. And we had an enormous job of preparing our Cape Cod house for weekly vacation rentals. We hadn't rented it in 25 years and our stuff was everywhere. My sister came to help, one of our sons helped with heavy lifting, and we worked like dogs. I then would drive down every Sunday and help with the turnover. My job was to change all the beds with clean linens I brought from home. I did fall from the bunk bed ladder, onto my new knee. Not much happened. But I now pull the mattress down to me and change it, I don't go up there.
I saw Dr. Burke for a six week check up. He was pleased at the range of motion my right knee had, and wants to see me every six months until we change out the left knee.
Our married kids have a wild two and a half year old boy (maybe like his father?) and are expecting another boy on Thanksgiving. I'll be going out to Ann Arbor, Michigan to help. By help, I mean chasing Mr. Two Year Old around.
We went to California for a vacation/visit with our old friends. I spoke of our friend who had been hit by a car decades ago and had tremendous leg issues. He had two knees replaced, within the past 18 months, with fantastic results. He and my husband would be fixing pool issues and my friend was kneeling on cement with two replaced knees! Ugh, I couldn't look.
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