Bilateral TKR Recovery Diary

Thank you for your kind words, everyone. I had always hoped to be helpful, my way of paying forward the help I got here, which was invaluable.

When walking upstairs about 9 times your bodyweight goes through your knee
Not doubting your word of course but how is that figure calculated? The highest I get is about 6 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/15099644

How much when jogging/running? Wouldn't that be loads more because of impact? I don't do that stuff, of course, although I do play table tennis which I'm sure is more stressful than climbing stairs! Perhaps I shouldn't...
 
I was so glad to hear of all the things you can do without pain. I needed to hear that right now. I was just talking to someone today who told me about her "tough-minded" friend who had both knees done at once, as I will, and
Who found the pain "unbearable". Just what I want to hear a week before my surgery.
 
Roy, thanks for the question. I ought to have put 'up to nine times'. The best I can find quickly is from http://www.livestrong.com/article/362729-weight-on-knees-during-stair-climbing/#ixzz2mkXihRVr that states: You put as much as three to eight times your total body weight in pressure on your knees when going up stairs. The bulk of the pressure is placed on the plateau on which the knee rests. Because of the angle at which you move your knees to ascend a set of stairs, the friction places more weight on the knees at more varying angles than most high intensity sports, according to the Queens University.
Your bodyweight is of course reduced by the weight of the limb below the knee joint!
As for hips there is also a concern following joint replacement - when I stand on one leg my bodyweight going through the standing hip is 5 times what I weigh, less the weight of the standing leg of course.


 
Roy, I don't know if you are the right person to ask, but if not you may know someone who can help. I am unable to tag people in my messages. The `quote me' option works fine, and I use that as an alternative to tagging, but its awkward.

I do know how to tag ie, no space after the @ sign and the persons name has to be exact. I've just tried to give an example, but it wouldn't accept it (I know because it started printing on top of what I'd just messaged!) thank you. Carol
 
ps: when I say `name' I mean their thread name eg, patient 99
If you see my thread name in the line above its clearly worked on this rare occasion.
 
As you type in the tagee's name a list of possible BoneSmart members appears, which gets shorter as people are eliminated as you type. You then double-click the one you want. patient 99
 
Clearly it has nothing to do with caps as it has accepted them. Just quirky I guess.
 
Hi Roy: just want to let you know I learned so much from you regarding exercises with out pushing, especially you have post so many photos illustrating thos exercises so clearly. Again, thank you for sharing and always providing useful advice to others. God bless you. Happy holidays!
 
You are most welcome. As I've said, those of us who hang around post-op are paying forward the benefits we gained from BoneSmart before our own surgery and recovery.
 
@Deeden Love the analogy of the new puppy/knee. Will have to remember that when my LTKR comes about August 22nd. Wish I had known it when I had my hip done back in Feb.
 
Roy,

That was a great read, I can not wait for my BTKR in January - I can not believe what it is going to be like to have no more pain, in my knees'

Thank You~!!!

-chris
 
This was my 2-year review (full version a page or so back). I've not put it in a quote so that you can see it all and it's not faded out. It's been shortened a lot, scroll back in the unlikely event you want to see it all.


Two year review

I go up stairs two at a time. Come down carrying things in both hands. Walk as far as I like

That's key; my knees no longer dominate my life. Just how cool is that?

Added 6th Dec: I am 61, retired almost 3 years. I am now actively considering taking a long refresher course (actually an entry-level course, the business moves that fast) in progamming using modern methods, then taking on maybe a job, maybe a project, maybe freelance work. The course is 3 months from January 2014 and will involve walking 0.6 miles to the station, 40 minute tube ride maybe standing, and back obv. This would have been unthinkable and impossible prior to BTKR.


Three year review

I completed the 3-month course in one of the mildest winters for years. It involved 12-hour working days and either walking to and from the station at either end, or cycling the 11 miles each way, which I was doing almost all the time by March. The course itself was absolutely fascinating but no work has come from it. I'm not bothered by that, the course was an adventure just by itself.

My knees have improved over the year. They are now 100% part of me, I don't notice them really at all. I get tired if I stand for long periods, but then so do people with biological knees.

I've taken up stretching exercises again as my knees were steady at around 135 or so degrees, and I thought I'd try for the full monty. Progress is slow but definitely there.

The most difficult thing I have found in recovery is regaining motivation, and I'm still struggling with it. Being lazy means the first three months post-op is easy, just watching telly. But afterwards it's getting more active again that's the problem. Especially for me in winter following my collar bone break 2 years ago.

However.

I've now discovered track cycling. 250 meter wooden Velodrome track, warm and dry and indoors and a 20 minute drive from my house. As of now I've passed Accreditation (like passing a driving test it's the minimum standard allowable) and have loads of training sessions booked over the next three months and hope also to join the track league (level C, the slowest group). Wish me luck.
 
Good Luck Roy!
The Velodrome sounds intense with other riders on the track.
 
@Roy Gardiner I have just read your 2 and 3 year updates with some envy. I still have a lot of pain almost every step from tight ligaments and occasionally muscles which suddenly tighten.
You motivated me so much during the early days, and I was convinced I would be like you and make a marvellous recovery, but it was not to be. I did recover at first and was virtually pain free before I firstly caught shingles inn May 2016 spent some time in bed, and took a long time to recover. I lost some ROM and developed patella tendonitis. I had a lot of hydrotherapy and was making a good recovery, when I was given a drug to prevent osteoporosis which is known to cause muscle and ligament problems, which turned my mild and well controlled epilepsy into a severe form which caused me to black out frequently and with no warning. I was banned from swimming, hydrotherapy and riding a bike. A year and a half later having had my drugs adjusted my epilepsy is giving me no trouble at all, but my ligaments are tight and painful. I have just restarted hydrotherapy. My ROM has dropped a lot and I have pain coming down stairs and getting out of chairs without using my arms. I try to use a static bike for a few minutes every day, but despair of ever getting out on mine again. My husband has covered it up with a sheet!!
You are the most positive person I know on bonesmart and being a Brit will know that the weather at the moment is not the sort to try a bike in. Could you give me any advice on how to get back to cycling again? I only cycle short distances, but do need my bike as I can't drive and even the Doctor is a mile walk each way. In the Cotswolds the buses are not very frequent, so despite the pain I do walk an awful lot.

I don't however have any trouble with my knees, they seem fine. It's the rest of my legs.
 
Such an interesting and inspiring account. Just read all of it today. BTKR 26 august 2019, and going along steadily. Hubby's just set off on his 50km cycle, and he keeps asking if I miss my cycling. Not yet. But I do miss my table-tennis. Thanks Roy.
 
Following on from 2 and 3 year review: the computer course was a success in itself, although I've barely used the knowledge since. Track riding has been a complete change of my cycling life, only now with Covid and the track closure have I missed significant time there

Nine year review
I have added nothing for many years now as there was little to say of interest to TKR people. My knees now are not something I really need to think about. I remember pre-surgery when not a day or an hour or a minute went past without my knees bugging me. How cool is it not to have to think about them :thumb:

However, in another thread:

I guess balance is my main concern. I can easily do one legged PT balance exercises to the point they said you do not need these. Maybe just paranoid...?
Balance on a bike and standing balance are quite different. You will have no bother whatsoever on the bike. I know this, my standing balance is still sub-optimal 9 years after BTKR, but I have no trouble on the bike.
Just before Christmas I was developing pain in by butt, hamstring and (slightly) in my back. I was worried about sciatica, my coach thought it might be Piriformis syndrome (https://www.spine-health.com/video/piriformis-syndrome-video) and encouraged me to see a physiotherapist, which I did.

I have, for nine years, thought my compromised balance (I find it very difficult to stand on one foot, for instance) was a direct result of having two mechanical knees and, possibly, damaged nerves in that area, meaning that signals between foot, lower leg and brain were compromised. Turns out I was wrong again.

The physio assured me it's not sciatica, and that the cause is muscular imbalance from the mid-back downwards. He has given me a series of exercises to correct this, and already after only a week I can feel the improvement.

He did not suggest that cycling has caused this problem, although to me it seems pretty reasonable that it has at least contributed. In 2016 I had neck pain so severe it was preventing me riding the bike. This same physio gave me an exercise that fixed the problem more or less at once.

Prior to 2016 the neck pain was an irritant that sometimes got to the point where I'd visit my osteopath who would 'crick' my neck and the pain would go away for a while. Since 2016 not only have I not needed to visit the osteopath but the background neck pain has completely vanished.

The physio and osteopath know each other (unsurprisingly, really) and liken the relationship of the professions (in my case anyway) to roadside rescue vs. garage. The AA/RAC (AAA I guess in the US) fix your broken down vehicle by the side of the road; proper servicing and maintenance makes your car run better and minimises the chance of such breakdown.

Knee 'physiotherapy' that involves pushing and shoving a TKR patient, causing pain, is in BoneSmart's view (and my own personal view) worse than useless. The kind of treatment outlined above is, however, IMO invaluable.

If you are a TKR patient and have balance issues after, say, 9 months or so in recovery, I suggest a physiotherapist is worth a visit.
 
Beautiful replies, completely agree, especially what Deeden said....hang in there! It's a journey right, and we all are looking forward to the destination.....there must be a reason why people say...love the new knee...maybe...poor memories of the long journey to healing!
 

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