THR Sissie's recovery

[Damn!]

Oh Poppett....Black Friday is the shopping day to end all shopping days. Stores here in the States have extreme sales and open extra early to kick off the Christmas shopping season. For example, WalMart had a Hewlett-Packart laptop on sale for $240. This year a large number of major retailers opened their doors on Thanksgiving Day and a lot are open all night. It is so much fun and the deals are great.

 

[Poppet]

Sounds a bit like our post Christmas sales, but we don't get bargains like that...

I avoid crowds like the plague these days..

 

[Damn!]

We also get to enjoy the crazy sales on the day after Christmas as well, but not to the degree of Black Friday. Usually I am in the thick of things with the Black Friday sales. We usually go out in a large group and divide and conquer in the stores. I really miss it, but will more than make up for it next year.

 

[Poppet]

I love this term divide and conquer

 

[C Mac]

Hi Sissy,

You had asked, "You are about 15 months ahead of me---about when did you begin to "forget" your new hip?"

My situation is a bit different than yours in that I had a congenital hip deformity and a surgery as an infant. As a result of that issue the head of my femur was misshaped and I had a leg length difference that went uncorrected until I was about 30 years old. With all these structural anomalies I had a bunch of accompanying compensations like changes in my spinal alignment and muscles of my legs and back. Don't get me wrong, this all worked fine for about 40 some odd years until I got some new hip discomfort that was diagnosed as OA and recommended to have the THR.

I have this wonderful new appliance with a nice round ball and socket but all those other structural anomalies have not had the ability to change the way they'd compensated from those 40 some odd years of the deformed ball. So, I have a variety of issues that I continue to try to adapt to as the year and a half has gone by. I am not sure that I'll ever achieve the truly "forgotten" hip. Sometimes it's a different process for those of us that have had CDH (congenitally dislocated hips/dysplasia or perthes disease).

I think that you are doing wonderfully from the different activities that you have shared. Part of what helps you forget about your new hip is returning to the activities that you did before surgery and wanted to do before surgery but might not have felt comfortable with. It's a bit of a testing and trusting process -- you test with an activity, stretch or motion and see how your hip responds. As you get further out from your surgery and back to so many activities you will trust that your hip can cope with what you are asking and start to think about it less frequently.

Take care,
Cardie

 

[sissy46]

Thanks, Cardie.

 

[Damn!]

You see Sissy...validation for what we have been telling you. You are doing FANTASTIC!!!!!! Many people, myself included, are envious of the phenomenal recovery and return to activity that you have experienced. I hope that you will continue to post on your activities as it is motivation for the rest of us to return to our favorite activities too. Keep up the great job!

 

[sissy46]

darn! Thanks for your kind words. A relative just asked me earlier "are you limping more?" when I didn't think I was limping at all, and it made me feel really bad, so thanks for perking me up. Of course she wasn't in town during the weeks before surgery when I had to hold my leg stiff in order to walk.

Anyway, Thursday and Friday were very active so I'm taking a slow day today, possibly a hike tomorrow, and kayaking on Monday. I should clean my condo but I think I'll read Dances With Dragons instead.

Tammy, do you know if you're on schedule to have X-rays at your Tuesday appointment? I didn't have them at my first appointment, and I was just thinking, perhaps if you called on Monday and let your OS know about the pain you're having maybe he'd go ahead and order them.

 

[Damn!]

It is my pleasure Sissy. Don't let that relative get to you. They have no idea what you have been through, nor do they understand just how much ahead of the recovery curve you really are. If I were there, I would knock him/her down with my ninja crutch moves...just for you!

Cleaning can always wait. How messy can it really be since you seem to always be out! Relax today and curl up with a good book. Being outside and communing with nature is way more beneficial to your recovery than killing a few dust bunnies.

The practice that I see my surgeon at has a digital x-ray machine in the office. Therefore x-rays are taken at almost every appointment. So, I should be getting one on Tuesday. I will try and snap a picture of them with my phone when I see them.

Tammy

 

[sissy46]

I love it when you offer to whack my tactless relative and tell me I don't need to clean house. So glad you're on my side Warrior in Chief!

 

[Damn!]

My pleasure fellow warrior!

 

[Poppet]

I love the way you girls are supporting each other - fantastic

 

[bellaroma]

Sissy, I concur with Tammy, folks say things so off the cuff and catty with no regard for how it makes you feel. I get so aggravated when relatives patronize me or tell me how so and so was a hip wonder.
darn! and I will do a double crutch slam on her

 

[Poppet]

The problem is that other people think.. Oh, you have had your surgery, now you are fixed!

They have no comprehension of the complexity of a THR. I had a similar situation so, I quickly pulled up a YouTube video of the procedure..

They become more sympathetic when they see it and you tell them, 'you know what! They dislocated my hip then amputated my leg, internally, then.....' we all get the picture here!

But we understand

 

[sissy46]

What a difference my BS buddies have made in my life these past few weeks! I only wish I had found BoneSmart before my surgery because a lot of my apprehension would have been allayed. My surgeon was kind enough to put me in touch with another of his patients who'd had the same procedure two months ahead of my surgery date, and that was very helpful---Ed offered encouragement and answered my questions, and he and his wife even came to see me in the hospital. So I've told my doctor about how helpful BS has been for me, and he was very interested. I've also offered to be available if he has other patients, who, like me, wanted to talk to someone who has had the experience.

My post-op course has been easy compared to some, but there have still been those discouraging days or comments that let me down, and my BS buddies have been there to give me a boost. Thank you!

 

[Damn!]

bellaroma, I will take them out from the left side if you will get them on the right. One swing each should take them!

Poppet, supporting these girls is sooooo easy. They are great and everything I send out to them comes back 10 fold.

sissy46, how nice that you were put in touch with someone local that had "been there, done that" and could act as a resource for you. I agree with you 100% as to the value of BoneSmart. If you will read the comments above, Beth and I are available to help you deal with pesky, insensitive relatives. Poppet, if you will put us up with a place to stay, we could take our act out internationally.

 

[bellaroma]

darn!, sounds like a plan. I got the right, Poppet yes, Tammy and I are both ready to take our hippster protection agency into the international arena, we will whack our way throught the injustices of ignorance to hipsters worldwide. Wouldn't ming going Down under either as that has always been a dream of mine since I was around 8 years old, basically the reef as I love the ocean and that is the beautiful in the world.

Sissy, we all stick together, we have good days, bad days and in-between days, but we are still ahead of where we were

 

[sissy46]

Yes, Down Under---it is summer down there But there are large sharks and, I think, crocodiles

Slowly but surely, we'll all get where we're going, with help from our friends. Remember those ads where they would shove a microphone in someone's face and ask "Now that you've won your fifth gold medal what are you going to do next?" and the person would say "I'm going to Disney World!" Well, now that I've got my new hip and I can walk, I'm thinking I want to go to Animal Kingdom. I haven't been in a long time, not since the year after it opened.

 

[bellaroma]

call me crazy, but I have always wanted to hand feed Blue Sharks and now they even have dive parties for it. Do not get me wrong I fear and respect the ocean, but there is no place I would rather be

 

[Damn!]

Just think Beth, our new and improved hips will probably stand up to a little shark bite!

Has anyone noticed that Poppet is not taking us up on our offer to right the wrongs of hippies Down Under???

Sissy, you should go to Animal Kingdom. You would enjoy it so much. Glad to see some warmer weather headed our way this week. Supposed to be another cold night tonight. Stay warm my friend.

Tammy