Some setbacks

I thought it would be useful to maintain a less verbose diary of the rehabilitation process so I am continuing this blog, as much for my benefit for the next operation as for anyone else who might find it useful. 

Thursday 19th July. 

Over the last few days my left leg has become stiffer and more painful so I arranged to go and see my sports injury therapist here in Anglesey. She advised me that the swelling in the ankle, the calf, the back of the knee and in the thigh needed to be massaged up towards the lymph nodes in the groin area, where the body deals with the material left by the healing process.

She, like Catharine, warned me against being too glib over the rehab from this surgery and she insisted that I keep the leg elevated more than I have been doing this far. So after her, quite brutal, massage yesterday late afternoon I have been resting and elevating more and again today I have spent most of the day taking it easy. 

During the treatment yesterday she manipulated the knee and was pleased with the slightly more than 90° flexation. I have continued to do my physio exercises and the knee is still doing ok but with some odd new pains. The problem I have at the moment is knowing wether the different pains I am experiencing are problematic or just different nerve endings re-joining. As an experiment today I have gone back to wearing my support stocking to see if this would help to reduce the swelling. 

The situation is still that I have to move regularly and not sit or stand for too long in any one position as I just get stiff. 

Catharine found this link on rehab expectations which makes for interesting reading. Generally I have exceeded all these goals.

Saturday 21st July

After two days of more elevated rest the swelling is no longer evident, except just over the knee, although the bruising and localised soreness continues in both the calf and thigh. Much of the pain I was experiencing before has dissipated but the lack of pain free flexibility is still a little frustrating. I only kept the compression stocking on for an 8 hour period on the Thursday and have decided not to use it again, for now anyway, as it made my leg quite irritable. 

Today I have removed the dressing from the surgery scar and all is well, although I am still struggling to sleep through the night and get tired quite quickly.