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THR Relieved and excited!

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Howdy all! Pain meds straightened out--switched from oxycotin to dilaudid with ondansetron for nausea and added in a smidge of valium for muscle relaxation (man does my hip feel tight!). I think that's been one of the most interesting things--the bone on bone stabbing pain in the groin is gone, but there's just an overall tightness to the skin/muscles. And now it's a bit itchy...hope it's just healing. I think the single most exciting thing that happened today was the new lady that "moved in" next door...she was screaming at her boyfriend/husband at the top of her lungs, cursing away. Had all the staff up in arms. Best hospital entertainment award for sure!

I think (and hope) I'll be headed home tomorrow. Just need to figure out how to get into/out of car better than getting into/out of bed. That's the most painful part of this--lifting my leg up to get in and pulling around in the bed. Practice is making perfect though.

And for those of you who are nervous--seriously, xanax that morning and tell your anesthesiology team to knock you to next Tuesday with the spinal & twilight. You can do this!
 
Sounds like you are well on your way to a great recovery. Glad the pain situation got worked out. You had me worried there for a bit thinking you were only going to be taking Celebrex. It is not at all what you need following surgery and you would have been one hurtin' puppy!
 
@doggievet - great report, happy to hear things are falling into place for a smooth recovery. Did they tell you to bring pillows to sit on in the car? It made it easier to bring the leg into the car.
 
@doggievet I too used dillaudid and it wasn't quite enough, when I told the OS about it, he mentioned that I should have used some Tylenol with it also....works much better he said...just a thought. Glad to hear you are doing well and it always helps getting some free entertainment while in recovery!! Keep up the good recovery and best wishes to you!!
 
@doggievet So glad to hear you had the surgery. I am going in for the second time in just a few weeks and looking forward to it! When I had my right hip done in February, they had me on tylenol and celebrex and I did fine with that...and icing of course. I never had to take a narcotic. I warned them beforehand that they make me too nauseous and dizzy. When I went home they had me on ibuprofen and tramadol. In the next few weeks you will notice the lifting of the leg and moving it around gets easier every day. It will feel heavy and hard to move at first, but those muscles will recover and get stronger every day. :happydance:
 
Wow! You are doing so well! Hope you are able to head home tomorrow. :SUNsmile:
 
Thanks @doggievet ...that is so sweet of you to say!

I had trouble with low blood pressure...even worse this time...for a few days I want allowed out of bed at all!!! drink lots and follow the advice....it does pass. I still feel dizzy at times...I just take it slow.

have you asked for some anti nausea meds????? They might help

take care
 
Lucky you with the great entertainment at hospital! Boredom has been tough. Hope you get to head home tomorrow!


Sheryl from Pittsburgh
LTHR on 4/2/2014
Sent from my iPhone using BoneSmart®
 
@doggievet I'm just catching your posts now. I'm not on the forum a lot any more--just not enough time in the day. But, I just want to tell you that I have severe metal allergies similar to what you described. I've even had to go no antibiotics twice for ear lobe infections, once for "nickel free" (yeah, right ...) and once for 14K gold earrings, so it's pretty bad. I have a Stryker titanium (they call it "tritanium") stem and acetabulum shell, with a ceramic head and high tech plastic liner, and haven't had a bit of trouble with it.

Glad you had it done. It will all get better from here on out.

Dorothy
 
@doggievet , slow and steady for now. That dizzy feeling will ease but just move slowly for now. Ask PT to give you a lesson about getting in and out of a car. You need a pillow and a plastic shopping bag so you can back in and then swivel to face forward. It's very easy once you see how it's done.
 
@rider1960 -- that's the hip I have now. So glad to hear that it hasn't given you any trouble!

So I'm a week out today and hard to believe it. I stopped taking all narcotics two days after I got home--couldn't take the nausea, even with the zofran to counteract. Now I'm just icing, meloxicam, aspirin (for anti-clotting) and a smidge of valium at night to relax the muscles. Getting around pretty well and finding it really humorous that I'm still attempting to limp and then realize that my hip isn't going to give out, nor do I have the bone on bone pain! Hooray! I'm still waiting to schedule my recheck visit, but am hoping he clears me for work within the next 3 weeks. Apparently all the nurses/PT/OT people were laughing when I told them that Dr. Mont said I'd be driving in a week and back to work in 2 weeks...hate to say it, but he's wrong...didn't feel like driving anywhere today!

Apparently they don't feel I need any PT other than just getting around the house and getting out when I feel like it, but they did send home a sheet of exercises which are easy enough. Actually, my main PT has been making bathroom trips & kitchen trips to the house while avoiding kids' toys, 2 cats, 2 snoozing senior collies and a crazy sheltie puppy!

As for the car, it's actually been easy--OT guys told me to lay the seat back, then lay in and swing leg up (husband had to help first day or two, but now I can do it myself). We have a mini-van and leather seats, so it hasn't been too hard. I'm more worried about when I go to get on the cloth seats of my work truck--high up and will have to pivot. That plastic baggie trick sounds great!

I think the hardest thing right now is that about 4 hours after I fall asleep at night, I wake up terribly uncomfortable and toss and turn for at least an hour. It's just so hard sleeping on my back! I've propped up legs and stuffed pillows on both sides and underneath, but can't wait to be on my side again. The PT/OT guys did say I could side sleep, but worried even with pillows stuffed that I'll slip and hurt myself anyway. So my poor hubby has to get up to get me fresh ice packs and then I can go back to sleep after a bit.

Some things I wish I'd heard (or remembered) before surgery though:
--buy tegaderm ahead of time so you can shower when you get home; makes life so much easier--waterproof bandage awesomeness
--buy super large panties (like serious granny-panties) so that they don't rub on your suture line
--bring a skirt (or kilt for the guys!) to the hospital for your trip home; so much more comfy than pants!
I'm sure there's more, but I worked all day and my brain is mush--too many emails to answer and fires to put out. Time to go sit on the deck and enjoy the nice springy evening (and make plans for all the stuff I'm going to do once I'm healed up!!!).
 
Glad to hear you are doing well. I really do think it's pushing it, though, to even attempt to go back to work full time until 6 weeks out or so unless you have a ton of flexibility with your job and can lie down to nap or at least rest whenever you need to. Maybe I'll be wrong, but I've been there and tried to do too much at the 2 or so week mark--just housework around my home and caring for myself and my dogs (I live alone), and I ended up crashing and I became so fatigued that I could barely speak coherently. Nothing else wrong with me--just absolutely exhausted. Before the crash, I remember getting on here and telling everything I had been doing, and @Josephine told me "you are doing too much" over and over. I kept saying--"but I feel fine!" Famous last words. Your body needs time to heal. Let it do this. Just sayin'

Happy recovery. BTW--love the collie--I used to have two collie. The most gorgeous dogs!!!

Dorothy
 
@rider1960 -- I hear ya! Fortunately I have my email & voicemail set to say that I'm not seeing patients now and have 2 house call vets who have offered to cover for me as needed. I've got some cats (easy visits) set up for the week of April 28th and am going to be super careful to only book one or two per day and then sleep. Big dogs are a no-no until mid to end of May for sure--one bump from a crazy 100 lb lab and I'm going down for the count, I'm sure. @Vetgirl -- did you notice any issues around the clinic post-op? I know they had you on lighter duty, but did you sneak in to help restrain or chase a cat or anything? I know I spend 75% of my time on my knees on the floor with big doggies...
 
You are so fortunate to be able to be off through April 28. I work at home child care with eight two legged little ones and being very careful with just reading stories, snuggling babies, and generally supervising while my assistant takes care of the other details. I can take rests as needed and still doing fine. I had been scheduling naps but then I don't sleep at night but that's different story. I get drained occasionally, but rest as needed. I'm only 12 days out, have been on "light" duty since Day 5. Its do-able just have to remember to take care of self first in order to take care of our little (and some not so little) ones. Sometimes, we don't get to take off 6+ weeks (or even 1 week) and need support in what we have to do and decisions we had to make to get this surgery done!

Skip the panties totally! Nothing to put on, nothing to rub on incision! Pull those skirts/dresses out and be free!
 
Wow.... @Me2 you are amazing to get back to work so soon. No way I could even contemplate it til, about 8 weeks. I had posterior though and was most probably in hindsight fighting an infection. Well done and do out yourself first!!!

@doggievet I'm so glad to find you doing so well....you are great to be contemplating heading back to work so soon. I know what you mean about working on the floor!!!

I think the worst thing about our type of work is that you can't just refuse to do stuff at times. As you know stuff happens and you react. I found in the days leading up to and after surgery, standing was the worst and so I found a stool at bottom height was great to lean on not actually sit. Oh and I avoided those wet floors too

In terms of going back I only got back to 2 x 3 hr shifts and went off with my infection...but I did help restrain a few animals but they were at a good height on the table....no chasing cats!!!! I would be super careful of twisting etc especially so soon out. I'm assuming you had anterior not posterior??? Posterior does limit you a lot more.

I will be watching your return carefully!!!! With interest and try and have a nurse with you

Keep up the great work
 
No not really amazing - for that anyway - I'm self employed, have child care program in my home, so I'm just being up and around and being here. I do have assistant that I needed for the past year to help me primarily because of this hip thing. With little children, to have taken time off, if my clients could have found alternative care, they may not have come back and the disruption to all our lives would have been much. I'm not a saint or martyr, its just what I have to do to keep roof over my head. I avoided surgery for long time because I could not take week off let alone 2 months. I am a "little" defensive when people say you HAVE to take XX time off work to do this -- not everyone can -- and we "need support in what we have to do and decisions we had to make to get this surgery done!" Like your line of work, sometimes I am having to do things I know I shouldn't but they are usually just automatic reactions and I do breathe sign of relief when I make it through one more day without one of my preschoolers accidentally jumping on me -- about the same as 30-50 dog! Just trying to let someone else (@doggievet) know that if you have to go back at 2 or 3 weeks, it is doable :console2:.
 
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