Today is June 27, which is almost 15 weeks since the operation. It feels like it has been an eternity since March 29.
I did not post a Month 2 update because my recovery rate has slowed down dramatically since Month 1, so having monthly updates would be boring to read for you all. From now on I am going to do updates every 2-3 months or so. I also do not want all the content on my site to be about surgery!
Additionally, I had to attend this thing called school every day so I could not update my blog as often. And there were these things called finals. Thank goodness that is all over now. (Not really, actually, there are also these things called summer assignments and standardized tests!!!!!!!!! But I will get through those.)
SCARRING: Anyway. By week 6, my scar started to crust over. It looked liked barnacles were covering my scars, and it felt dry an scaly. But after that week the scabs fell off and my scars started to look like normal scars—they were pale pink with white lines in the middle. The area around them was still numb and itchy. If I was not careful, I would itch too hard and partially reopen my wounds.
INDEPENDENCE: By week 6 I was also back to my normal daily routine. I could now stand up and shower myself, and walk up and down the stairs comfortably. At home, even though I was walking with a limp, I did not use crutches. I was also running up the stairs (not running on level ground, though). By week 7, I ditched the crutches at school. I could now walk at a normal pace and could tolerate some pushing and shoving in the halls. By this point I had grown accustomed to all the stares I received from my various knee braces. I have worn knee braces so often that they are practically another part of my body!
PHYSICAL HEALTH: I was always an active person so this surgery was a bummer in terms of my physical fitness. I hated sitting around all day! Thankfully I found a few decent chair workouts on YouTube that I followed along with to keep myself in some kind of shape. If you’re in my position I highly recommend this one , but just be careful and perform only the exercises that you can handle.
My left quad was still a lot smaller than my left. To be precise, as of May 31, my left leg was 32.96 cm and my right quad was 35.81 cm. That’s almost a 3 centimeter difference! Also, when I was walking my left leg jiggled significantly more than my right. Wacky.
PHYSICAL THERAPY: At least, in the midst of me moping about my declining physical health, by the beginning of month 3 I started to do a lot more off-the-table exercises at physical therapy. I did not half to do quad swim or hamstring sets anymore. Here is a list of some of the exercises I have been doing as of late:
Functional walks: Walk in a line like a zombie with your arms out
Functional squats: Duck waddle in a line
Squats (30x)
Split squats: Otherwise known as lunges; these exercises are the hardest in my opinion. They work your quads the most. (3 sets of 10 for each leg)
Step ups/downs (3 sets of 10)
Balancing on left foot (3 sets of 20 sec)
Leg press (65 lbs)
Clamshells
Leg raises (without brace, with 1.5 lb weight; 3 sets of 10)
Heel slides: I am at full range of motion for bending! When I am sitting around for a long time I have to warmup before I can comfortably bend all the way, but at least I can bend my leg all the way. Yay!
Towards the end of month 3 I was starting to walk like a completely normal person again. In this time period I attended 2 banquet-party events where I was up dancing (if you can even call it dancing…) for 5 to 6 hours, and I went to the local fair where I was on my feet riding rides that were at least 20 years old. My knee did not hurt after any of those, which was a good sign.
3 MONTH POST-OPERATION APPOINTMENT: My appointment with Dr. Strauss was three days ago. He said all good things! I was right on track with the recovery protocol. I am not allowed to do any kind of sport yet, but I am now allowed to not wear any sort of brace at all. I can walk as much as I want. I am also allowed to start running on the Alter-G treadmill at therapy. It’s a type of treadmill that alleviates a specific percent of bodyweight when you run. These are all huge milestones for me. Pretty cool!
I will be back with more knee updates in a couple of months. Overall, I am very pleased with the results of my surgery so far, but my recovery is far from over. Even though I am walking normally and I look like I am functioning normally, there is a lot of frustration and pain that goes along with this entire process. My left leg is still extremely weak and I still have about 9 months to go before I gain my full quad strength back. I will never be able to do rigorous sports again (for the sake of both of my knees), but that is fine because at least hopefully after recovery is done and through, my knees will be healthy and I will be happy. That is what matters most.
Stay tuned for some more summer posts! I will do my best to post at least once a month.
—Katie
Katie Tan 