Over exhuberance does not pay off!

The title of this post is something I should know, but bloody mindedness and impatience are the enemies of rational thought.

After having felt pretty good for a week or so I decided to walk to the local shops using only one crutch. The going was good on the way, but pretty ropey on the way back.   I’ve been paying for this little excursion ever since, scarily in the form of well known discomfort.  My hip has felt like it used to on a really bad day pre op; all sore and stiff with a few stabby pains thrown in for good luck. New pains I can deal with, they’re spose to be there, but old ones can take a hike; they haven’t though, not for the last 3 days.  To be honest I have been for little walks, done the hoovering, got the washing in and been for a swim, so I guess not resting up properly might have something to do with it!!

This did knock me a little and I even had a 5 minute strop involving tears and the immortal words “was it even ****** worth it” followed by “I’m getting the same ****** pains and I’ve one ****** leg longer than the other which is making my ****** back hurt”.   As you can see I was feeling somewhat sorry for myself and a little angry!! Incidentally insert whatever naughty word you fancy into the ****** bits, I think I may have used a variety!    My lovely man just listened to my mini outburst, let me shed my ‘woe is me’ tears and waited until I was calm enough to be rational again.

I’m back to my normal self and realise that as a wise hippy (Annick – wibbly wobbly blog)  said ‘Just because I can, doesn’t mean I should!’  I need to chill, no matter how good I feel in myself I have to listen to my hip and be nice to it rather than beast it. After all it has been sawn, chiselled, and screwed back together….. that was just over 10 weeks ago though, surely I should be able to run a marathon by now!

Post op check up 7 weeks (ish)

My mum, dad and I hobbled (well just me hobbling mum and dad have fully working legs!) down to London on Friday for a post op check up with Marcus Bankes.  As expected I had X-Rays (see below) then I met the man himself….and the verdict is;  My bones are healing really well, I’m ready to begin bearing weight and I am to aim to lose the crutches within the next four weeks. I’m only allowed to drive once I’m off the crutches, oh and I’ll need a cane for a while after I’m fully weight-bearing.  I can now go swimming – YAY! but not biking yet – even in the gym, darn it! I can once I’m fully weight bearing though so that’s something to look forward to.   As for the difference in leg length that is a little bigger than expected, so it looks like I may need an insole in my left shoe to even me out, now can you get insoles for peep toe heels?!

As for when leftie will be done, that’s a whole different story to what I expected. I’ve now been told that until I get pains in it (I guess to a similar extent to my right hip was pre-op) I won’t be considered for a second surgery. Now I was always under the impression that both were definitely going to be done, and probably within a year of each other (I was hoping sooner but that was pure impatience).  Obviously it’s a good thing that surgery won’t be done unless needed, only in my head I was having the next one done pronto then cracking on with normal life.  It’s just a matter of changing my mindset, crack on with normal life then leftie will happen somewhere along the way, more than likely at the most inconvenient time!

Pre op wonkiness

 

Nice screws!

 

Check out how my bones have healed - YAY for bones!

 

Physio is lined up for later this week, and my next hospital appointment is set for 6 weeks, by which time I’ll be walking!!

Physio

My first physio appointment was last week, and it was all pretty good.  As suspected the guy had never had a patient who’d had a PAO before, but was clearly in the know about most elements of it – phew!

I’m now allowed a tiny bit more weight bearing, but the physio (Matt)was reluctant to do too much until I’ve had my check up at Guys. In the meantime I have 3 new exercises, all of which stretch my lower back out as well as hip flexor and quads.  He assessed my leg length difference and concluded that it’s not as bad as it looks; the muscles on the left leg have tightened up enough to make that leg appear a lot shorter than it actually is, hence the exercises to stop my back muscles pulling so hard.  Without seeing my X-rays Matt could only assume that my pelvis is a bit out of line, but with a slight change in bone structure (to say the least!) needs X-rays to be sure. Bearing all this in mind he seemed to think the difference in my leg lengths will only be about a cm, which is not so bad. Shame I won’t be a full inch taller though!

Friday sees my first hospital check up, and I’m looking forward to seeing the changes in my X-rays (hopefully I will get copies of all of them too).  I do need to be realistic though; I have visions of being able to get back in the gym and pool next week, as well as finally being allowed to drive, but this might take a couple of weeks. After all I’m still using 2 crutches to get around at the moment and the thought of coming off them is both exciting and daunting!  It’s been just over 7 weeks and putting my full weight on my operated leg still feels  a way off – only mentally though, I think the leg will be ok so long as I don’t do too much!

6 weeks post op

I can’t believe it’s already over the 6 week mark, mind you thinking back to the op it feels like a life time ago now.

So where am I up to?  Still not getting a full nights sleep, thankfully not due to pain, just discomfort either in my hip or in my back.  I can now lie on my front and non operated side, but having tried the operated side for a mere 5 seconds decided that I’m not quite ready for that giant leap just yet.  My back isn’t causing me pain, it just feels like the small of my back is compressed and no amount of wriggling around seems to ease it.  Pre-op I was able to click my hips to help with back issues, clearly leftie still cluncks nicely, but I’m reluctant to try rightie just yet!

My scar is looking ok, (pic to follow), though on occasions does look a little bruised, that is probably due to me having been a little brutal with the bio oil! 

Scar at 6 weeks

 

I get a sense that I can feel the screws on occasions, but only because across the front of my hip feels a bit numb and different, as though it’s not quite all me, but other than that I’ve not felt them yet.

The muscles on the operated side have been visibly disappearing since around week three,  I pretty much have no right bum cheek and my already skinny leg is about a couple of inches smaller in circumference – not such a good look in shorts! My left leg and butt cheek, however, is buff!  The length of my leg is still an inch or so longer, I’m yet to find out if this will change at all. Maybe the bashing about of my pelvis during the op put me off kilter, and it’ll all level out nicely.

I can get around a lot more easily and can even pick things up off the floor without too much anguish by sticking my operated leg out behind me. Attempting to bend and going too far over my right angle allowance causes a bit of discomfort so I guess my bones just aren’t ready.  I have been a bit sneaky and put a little extra weight through my leg, and it all seems to be ok, though I don’t feel ready to lose the crutches yet.

My physio appointment has been changed so my first one is this coming Friday, I will be going armed with op info and diagrams in case of ignorance! Now all I need to do is sort out the list of questions for my hospital check up next week, oh and remember a memory stick to get copies of my x-rays – Yippee!

2 weeks 5 days – 3 weeks 3 days

2 weeks 5 days is how long it took me to feel real pain. At a friends wedding my leg decided it had really had enough, which resulted in the feeling that there was a knife being jabbed in my groin and that my leg was trying to detach itself from my body. This meant leaving the wedding earlier than expected (boo hiss), tears of pain (youch!), some lovely friends looking after me and helping me get up to bed when I got home (hurray!), and about 4 morphine tablets in the space of 5 hours!  Now considering I’d only been taking one painkiller before bed for almost 2 weeks it was a bit of a shocker. Anywho, thankfully the pain has never returned to that extent, although my hip has been grumbling along similar lines.  This concerns me as I’ve been pretty much pain free from the off with or without pain killers, and now when I initially sit  down (on a soft seat the right height and everything) I get a pain going from my bum bone as a dull ache and escalating to a stabby pain in my groin. Once I’m sat down it’s ok unless I have to shuffle around, or when I get up.  Has anyone else had a similar experience? I’m now 3 and a bit weeks out of surgery and it feels a little bit like I’m going backwards, which is just not cricket!

At this point in time it would seem as though the millimetres of difference in my leg lengths is all a myth. Currently it looks like about an inch difference. Now I’m all keen for growing a little, but an inch seems a bit extreme – here’s to hoping there’s still some swelling in the joint that’s causing the problem, if not I need to get my other leg done quickly so I match!

2 weeks and 2 days…

…is how long it took me to be able to lie on my non-operated side – such a relief!!!  oh and 2 weeks and 3 days is how long it took for me to have a little frustrated tear or two. Not a major sob but all things considered it was probably about time, my man took it in his stride then we went for a hobble down the village to get my outta these four walls. All better now.

Oh I nearly forgot, have a Physio appointment at the local hospital on the 21st August, very excited!! It’ll bring me a step closer to getting back on my feet.  Though I won’t actually be weight bearing until at least the 4th September which is when I have my post op check at Guys.

One step at a time…

Saturday was my first big day out post-op and all went well.   A lovely sunny day at a friends wedding and muchos hobbling and merriment was had. The operated leg didn’t exactly behave itself in spite of the fact that lots of people were looking out for me and it; because I wasn’t wearing the super sexy TED stockings (a pre checked day off from orthapedic nurse!) my entire leg swelled up not the usual down to my knee, which was nice.   It had been propped up, rested and hobbled around all day, but nothing made it happy. Thankfully it was only a little uncomfortable and not particularly painful. In-spite of my slight difficulty in moving around all went swimmingly with the leg.  As for the wedding itself it was beautiful and lovely and fun and the happy couple were, well, very happy, ahhhh bless them.

Since it’s long day out my leg has felt bruised, I can only assume it’s my muscles feeling a little battered from the ordeal because no bruises have appeared so far.  On the subject of bruises my stomach has a nice collection going on, to the point that I have developed a little lump in one part of my tummy. It turns out that the anti-coagulants I’m injecting may also be helping me to bruise more easily, nice! 

My man and I ventured out for a little hobble today, found a little footpath that was part concrete/gravel so the wheelchair could be used if needed, and it was.  It’s amazing how tiring it gets hobbling along. Now I wouldn’t say I was at the peak of fitness pre-op but I was certainly no couch potato, so to get tired out so quickly is somewhat frustrating, I reckon I hobbled about 400m and that’s a generous estimate. The other 200m I used the wheelchair in self-propelling mode. I think my steering got a little better on the flat, but as soon as there was a little downhill it all got a bit too much especially as the path was curving to the right at the time, I very nearly ended up in the stinging nettles!  Still that was only my second outing, there’s plenty more time to practice, specially if it enables me to get outside for longer :0)

Early days

So since I got home how’s things going? Initially a bit painfully and very sleepily, Saturday afternoon I had to wait for my leg to deflate a little before I could hobble around, and even then I was very unsteady.  Managed the stairs with supervision and sleep was a bit painful. I think after being in a hospital bed that moved where you wanted it too (fancy pants buttons and everything!), it took some time to work out how I needed to sleep in a normal bed comfortably. Anyway I was very tired and in more pain than I had been in hospital, but nothing that couldn’t be solved with tablets.

Sunday I was very sleepy and the hip was still smarting. My lovely fella shopped for and cooked (while I had a 3 hour sleep on the sofa!) a roast dinner for my folks and little Nannie, which was scrummy. Mind you I had a tiny plate of food as my appetite seemed to have disappeared, something that is unknown where roasties and Yorkshire puds are concerned!   After tea more napping ensued and a little unsteady hobbling around, but all in all I was not on form.

Monday things felt a bit better, but the frustration of not being able to carry stuff around started to get to me, no tears, just a little rant to myself every now and again!  The pain was under control, still taking the meds as prescribed and hobbling was speeding up. Managed a one legged supervised shower, the perching stool goes in the shower, but you can’t close the door which isn’t much use unless you want ducks setting up home in the bathroom!  Spent a bit too much time sat up at the table – leg returned to former swollen glory :0(

Tuesday my man was out early and I was left to my own devices for 3 hours. A little bit of stroppiness may have risen it’s ugly head as I tried to get dressed. The grabber dropped to the floor while I was sat on the bed, then in the bathroom the loo roll did a similar thing with no grabber in sight – somehow I managed to use my crutches to lever things around so all was not lost, just took a blooming long time! I then  hobbled downstairs to get brekky. Hmm how do you get cereal from one room to another without spilling it?! Well I decided to go with toast; bread from the freezer transported in mouth to toaster, shuffle to fridge to find jam, jam on sideboard as far as I can reach, hobble a bit, shuffle the jam a bit, hobble a bit, shuffle the jam…. etc until I got level with the toaster.  Get out a knife, can’t be bothered to do the whole shuffle/hobble thing with a plate so spread jam on toast and eat whilst perching on stool.  Not too frustrated after that rigmourol then!  I had managed to find my little rucksack which means I can now transport stuff around the house for myself, although loading and unloading it can be a pain in the butt,  specially if you have a sieve like memory and can’t remember where you unloaded all the gubbins that you collected an hour ago!   The name of the game post op is definitely organisation. Know what you want before you want it and plan how to get it, whether by poor long-suffering boyfriend (who is constantly just about to sit down after making us a cuppa only for me to say, could you get me …..?) or by own transport rucksack stylee. I am not a very organised person, pre op I would frequently run upstairs to get something, find something else to bring down then have to go back up for whatever it is I wanted in the first place. This is not a good scenario when you can only carry what you can fit on your back, and when after a couple of goes up and down the stairs you need a little nap! 

Tuesday; a good nights kip, feeling more like me again and managed to dress fairly quickly without much ranting -HURRAH! A step in the right direction. Also for the first time since the op I can see my right knee cap in it’s knobbly glory!!!  Thigh is a little swollen but a marked improvement.  Still taking pain meds but leaving the gap between them slightly bigger just to see what the score is, nothing having a major grumble so it would seem that I could reduce them a little.  The problem with feeling more like myself is that boredom is now setting in, on day 3 of being at home full time. This does not bode well.   Had a visit from a friend who was really mean and bought scrummy biscuits!  A pretty positive day all round.

Wednesday; had an uncomfortable nights sleep, the compression stockings are far too good at keeping your feet warm, so I got a little overheated. I’ve been told that I have to wear them for the 6 weeks until I go for my check up. (not the same pair you’ll be pleased to hear, I have a spare!). If we ever get a real summer I’ll never get any sleep – overheating from the feet up just isn’t fun!  Had a very exciting excursion today; we’ve hired a wheelchair from the British Red Cross as we’re off to a wedding on Saturday (see CK on blogroll – V excited), and to go the distance figured that a wheelchair and crutch combo is going to be a winner. So for our road test I hobbled out to the path, boyfriend brought out the wheelchair cushioned and ready for action. It was a relatively short journey down the road, but still there was plenty of room for crap steering from yours truly, nearly went off the curb a coupla times, but I did manage to do a full 360 turn when it was time to come back!  I chose to hobble back and expend some of the pent up energy, which worked cos I fell asleep when we got back!   Being sat in a wheelchair is very odd, I felt like a bit of a fraud really, as I can hobble, but not for any length of time yet. We only met a couple of people along the way, but they gave me a puzzled look.  

 I’ve not really taken many pain meds at all today, only one lot of parcetamol and ibruprofen, and one lot of the morphine based painkillers, pretty darn good considering it’s now half eight at night.  Maybe it’s time to start properly weaning myself off them, I’m just not sure of the best way to go about it. Do I quit the nasty morphine ones altogether and rely on normal painkillers, or do I only take a couple of doses of each?

Well I’ve waffled another significant amount – that’s what being left on your own for a couple of hours does to you! I think a day by day account might be a little over indulgent so I’ll calm it down now. Also with my new found energy I’ll hopefully get to play outside a bit more.

Still here…!

I didn’t realise how long it’d been since I’d done anything hippy related, until my mum pointed it out yesterday. So here I am waffling on again!

The last couple of months have been hectic with finishing off my course and I’ve only a week and a half to go – YIPPEE!  All being well I’ll be a qualified teacher and everything :0)

Whilst having the hectic life that revolves around school other things have taken a bit of a backseat. The biggest of these being exercise, which is definitely not a positive step.  I have managed to keep up Pilates, which is fantastic and I’d recommend it to anyone and everyone, especially if you find a great teacher who knows what alternatives to give to slightly broken people such as myself.  Anyway I’ve two sessions lined up the week before my op and as soon as I can get back to it I’m getting a couple of one to ones to get me back into doing the classes.

This weekend saw me having the first of two hypnotherapy sessions aimed at keeping me chilled about having an epidural. I’m not that bothered about needles, apart from, it seems, the one going into my spine. The last thing I want to be doing is fidgeting and twitching with nerves while the anesthetist is doing this. Anyway the first session was very positive, and anything that helps is a goer in my book!

Had a bit of a scare this week – bearing in mind the cancellation of my last op, I managed to get yet another cold! At first I thought it was hay fever, but it didn’t respond to the usual drugs and just felt like a cold.   Fortunately unlike the last 3 week lurker it seems to have dissipated, fingers crossed I’ll not be in snotsville for too much longer!

On the subject of runny noses I have a tendency for mild hay fever, but today managed to fall asleep in amongst lots of flowering clover – not the brightest choice on a warm, sunny, breezy day! DOH!   Another stupid thing that I do fairly frequently is to take out my contact lenses and then go looking for my glasses. Needless to say it takes me a lot of time stumbling about blindly to sort this particular issue out.  I really need to stop this, especially when hobbling about on crutches …. I sense tears of frustration would be the outcome and they certainly wouldn’t help me see any clearer!

I had my second Pre-op this week, it’s so long since the first one the hospital need to check I still have the same blood!  All went smoothly, the only mild trauma was getting weighed, I’m still in the ‘healthy’ category for my height, but right at the top of the scale – RUBBISH!  So much for living on rice cakes if that’s what they do for you BRING ON THE BISCUITS!  I’ve heard from a couple of people that the post op painkillers suppress your appetite as well as your pain, so I might yet be a bikini model, albeit one with one normal and one twiggy leg!

I’ve 2 weeks to go, and don’t feel half as panicked as before.  Perhaps now is just a better time mentally if not physically. Still it’s a bugger that we’ll have no summer holiday, but I intend to have as many outings as my hip can contend with. The other thing I’m looking forward to is having time to do exercise (mostly after the non-weight bearing time), it’s been ages since I had a really good heart pumping muscle aching work out – only a couple of months and I’ll have to make time if I want to get back on my feet, and I can’t wait.

Oh something else I’ve decided to aim for when both hips have been done is learn to play tennis. Not a surprise considering Wimbledon is on at the minute, but it’s something I fancy doing every summer, so next year the boy and I are hoping to get a couple of lessons then go play in the park with friends.  The last time I played tennis was at school, and I had plenty of power, but absolutely no control whatsoever!  I spent an inordinate amount of time retrieving the ball from over the fence and halfway across the hockey pitch which is where I’d managed to launch it during serving!  Hmm maybe tennis isn’t my game.

Right waffle over, better get back to planning lessons, Fractions anyone?!

Something to aim for.

Today saw one of the first sprint triathlons of the season being held, in our village of all places. So the boy and I headed up to the competitors area to take a sneaky peek at what we hope to be doing next year.  In a former life I did a bit of swimming so the 400m in the pool doesn’t phase me too much, though the speed of this years competitors does!  The boy, on the other hand, who is sporty and lithe, sinks like a stone and is somewhat peturbed about pool, but fairly confident with the biking and running.  My main concern (apart from collapsing from exhaustion half way through the bike ride, only to have my behind whooped by the other competitors as they streak like lightening past me) is my hips.  Now I’m thinking on the positive side of things and with the first hip sorted in July, recovered well enough to get the second sorted 6 months later in January, that gives me a little over 3 months from the second op to be well enough to compete … hmm a little optomistic maybe?!

On the hip front, rightie is playing up as usual with a few extra bonus twinges, and leftie does not appreciate the hopping action with crutches, it even had the audacity to start giving grief whilst walking last week. Ur..NO! I say. That is not in the grand plan, and is not allowed, fortunately leftie has quit the grumbling for now – at least until I try and climb the stairs  on crutches again!