8/52

(Nothing excited happend for 7/52, I was on the turbo, that's it)

I had my last trip to the consultant yesterday. He said that I am 'doing well for 8 weeks' and that I can start to run again. No climbing yet. Climbing comes when running is fine and the legs nice and strong and happy with twisting and angles. I finally got my x-ray images too, that's my knee over there.

Physio today gave me some more exercises to get on with. Still trying to get the strength back in the poorly leg.

This evening I had my first run. It was 11 minutes and 20 seconds long, covering a massive 1.33Km. I have to run in as straight a line as possible, so watching me run is a bit like watching those turtle things you programmed at school. Surprisingly though the leg felt fine, and whilst I was really pensive about my first few steps they were fine and running wasnt a problem. Physically I felt like I could run longer, but I am going to be a good boy and keep it small distances. I'm not sure I have ever been this happy to do a pavement pounding recovery run.

More turbo action tomorrow. Plan is to alternate turbo and run nights, and then do the strength and range of motion exercises every night.

6/52

It's actually the 7th week, but I seem to be blogging a week late.

The brace came off this Monday (the 5th). So now the atrophy has finally stopped, and I'm working on building my leg back up again to full strength. I need to get the muscle built up again and also working on the extension and the flexion. All three of which have degraded over the last month and half.

Exercises: Still spinning out at least 40 mins on the bike every day. Squats (one and two leg). Lots of standing on one leg. I also have a few Bending and straightening exercises to get my full range of motion back.

I'm definitely getting stronger, but I still have a way to go. Comparing the circumferences of both thighs the top and middle of the right are 20mm larger then the left. Hopefully all the exercise and build that back into a matching pair.

Sleeping is a lot easier without the brace on too. I now don't have to wake up to roll over. It's also quicker to get comfy and actually get to sleep.

I can now shower again (without getting the brace soaked and having to wait a couple of hours for it to dry).

The other good news with not being in the brace is that I can wear all my clothes again. I now fit in all my trousers, and I'm not limited to just the two pairs.

I have another follow up with the consultant on the 19th. I can find out when I can run and climb again then. I'd also still like to know what the screw is made of and if I can have an MRI again. I should also get a copy of the x-rays too (if I remember to take my memory stick).

5/52

Not much to say for this week. I got my turbo trainer last Thursday and I've been spinning out 30-40 minutes a day on it. Turbos are boring, but it's good to be exercising again. I've missed doing cardio work!

Brace off on Monday, all being well....

4/52

On Monday I went for my checkup. Not a lot to say, the Dr (didn't see the consultant) didn't say much and I wasn't there long. I did see my x-rays though, so that was good. The screw's a lot longer than I expected. If I take a memory stick with me next time I see the Dr/Mr then I can get a copy.

Today I had physio. The brace was unlocked to it's full range. Which is a nice change from being set at 90!

I also had a go on an exercise bike. That was really good, great to be doing some proper leg work. I'll be ordering a turbo trainer shortly and spinning on the Kona very soon. I'm excited at the though of doing some cardio work again.

Other than that I'm still walking and doing my other exercised. I just about have my walking pace back again. I marched home from the chippy the other night taking about 10 minutes to cover a bit over 1km. I'm glad about that, I've been getting bored shuffling about taking ages getting anywhere.

Roll on another 2 weeks until this brace comes off.

3/52

There's not a lot gone on this week. I've been doing my exercises two or three times a day, and I've been going to work every day. Excluding sport, life is pretty much back to normal. I can buy things, walk about, I'm even painting and taking photos again.

I had physio again this week, although since I was told not to remove the brace by the surgeon there wasn't a lot the physio could do. She gave me a couple more exercises to get my quads building back up again. It's already noticeable how much my left leg has atrophied compared to the right.

The only other thing to note is that I've taken all the dressings off now. The wound is all but healed. Blood flow looks fine, if I press the skin the blood comes back just as fast as on the other leg. The only problem is that I seem to have lost sensation in the skin above half my patella. I guess that it's some nerve damage, I am going to see the consultant again on the 21st so we can find out for sure then. I also cant make my leg hyper-extend, that could be more nerve issues or it could just be the muscles cant do it at the moment.

2/52

It's the 2nd week after the op. This week I have:

• Walked to work and back every day (except the Bank Holiday).
• Walked to town and back a couple of times, and have coffee with my friends most days.
• Taken photos of ducks and spiders.
• Started my commissioned painting. I need to go to Guildford tomorrow and get lots of art supplies.
  
• Had the dressings removed from the knee and had the ends of the stitches cut, nurse said it was healing nicely.
• I can bend the leg to the full 90 with a bit of gravity assist (off the edge of the bed), and almost to 90 when I slide the heel up the bed.
  

So all in all, life is started back up again. I cant do sport at the moment, but I have my two arty hobbies back and I can walk about now.

Getting Back On Track

Not a great deal to write about, walking is getting slowly better and I'm keeping up all my exercises.

The big news from today is that I went and took the camera over the common. First time in over two weeks. Macro photography is harder with a knee in a brace, I cant kneel at the moment. The windy weather didnt help either, but the important thing is that I have at least one hobby I can still do.

Back to the office in the morning.

Look Ma, No Hands

Just a short post. Today I renounced the crutches all together. I walked to town using my own two legs, I bought my own shopping and I even got myself a coffee. It took me about twice as long as it normally would, but it's early days.

The physio said that I might want to use the one crutch to walk about outside, but I was feeling quite strong when I was pottering about the house. So I decided to try without the clicky stick. I got to the end of the road and was feeling fine, so I carried on.

It's amazingly liberating to be able to walk completely unaided after spending the last two weeks on crutches unable to use my hands for anything other than walking.

Hot on the heels of that success, I had a wander to the garage and bought some chocolate. I measured out the route and it's a 2km round trip, which took me 30 minutes. So by this evening I was limping at about 4kph, which works out at 2.5mph rather than my usual cruising pace of about 5-6mph. Still I cant expect to be on my usual form just 1 week after surgery.

Next week I am planning on going to the art shop in Guildford to pick up the things I need for my current commission. I was expecting to not be able to do this for many weeks. Really pleased about that. I feel like life is starting again now.

Now time for some more leg strengthening exercises...

1/52

I can walk!

I had my first physio appointment today. The first thing the nice physio lady had me do was walk without crutches. She's said that I can walk about at home without them, and I just need the one of them for when I'm out.

So this afternoon I have been pottering about the flat completely un-aided. I even made a couple of sarnies and carried them to the living room on a plate. No longer do I need to put my food into a tuppaware box and then carry that to the living room in my rucksack! Later I think I'll make a pot of tea.

I've been given a few more exercises to get on with. I need to get my hamstrings nice and strong to help out the ACL. I'll be doing those religiously each day, and will hopefully be back to strength soon.

I think that I will return back to the office next week (after the bank holiday).

All in all, it's been a good day!

Getting There

Yesterday I started to walk a lot easier. I'm not sure what happened, I just noticed that I was putting a lot less weight though the crutches.

I've been trying to increase the amount I can bend the knee, and I think that I'm down to about 100 degrees.

All of the bending seems to be helping with the weight bearing too. After a day's trying to bend the thing, it's now much happier bearing weight. I just found myself standing with my weight spread evenly between both legs.

I'm starting to feel a bit encouraged about the recovery. I can cope without sports for now, but I'm missing being able to walk about unaided. Simple dream; but I cant wait to get back to walking to the office, having coffee with my friends at the coffee shop and buying and carrying my own shopping from the supermarket.

Getting comfy in bed and sleeping for long periods is still beyond me, hopefully when the stitches are out the wound will hurt less and let me sleep on my side.

Physio on Friday, hopefully they will have some more exercises to get me walking quickly.

A Coffee And A Limp

Not a lot to say about today. Sleeping is still proving a problem, so it was another late start to the day.

After a wash and before I got dressed I had a go at removing my brace on my own. I have to remove it every day and have a peek at the leg to see if it's gone septic. I'm not allowed to do a straight leg lift, as it puts too much strain on my ACL. So up until today I have relied on someone holding my leg up for me while I fiddle with the awkward velcro straps of the brace. Thankfully I have found that I can remove the thing whilst keeping my leg nice and relaxed on the bed, so that's another thing I can do for myself.

Phil and Ray took me into town to go for a coffee. It was nice to be out in the sun, but walking is still really hard. I think I'm still putting too much weight through my arms too, so I'm getting tired quickly from the 'walking'. That is something I need to work on.

My range of motion is slowly getting better. I've been sat in my chair sliding my heel slowly towards me. It's hard work and the knee still feels really tight, but there's improvement over the last few days.

My quads aren't as strong as they were, amazing how things can atrophy in just a couple of weeks. I've been tensing them and they are starting to quiver less.

I managed to cook myself some nice pasta for tea too. I can stand quite happily at the cooker, but the leg starts to ache after a while. Still, it's very early days.

Back Home

I'm back at home, and starting the long road to recovery. Everything I have read says that it's going to me about a year before I am properly back to sports. In the mean time I am starting to get the leg moving as best I can.

I'm able to walk about, I have even been out to hobble round Tesco and go out to Costa for a coffee. I'm on the crutches still, as the leg wont take full weight, so for now I cant carry things unless I put them in a rucksack. I hope to lose the crutches soon, if I work hard at my exercises.

At the moment I think that my range of motion is about 120ish degrees. My recovery plan says that my brace is set to 90 degrees for the first four weeks, and then it will be opened up completely for the remaining two weeks.

It's not going to be fast, but I will make this leg go again. I have a trip to New Zealand in 7 months time. My plans of climbing and running there are out now, but I want to be able to walk about and take pictures.

Now, back to the exercises!

O.R.I.F

Friday 21st August 2009

I had to be at the hospital bright and early, to be the first person in theatre. Phil and Kim dropped me off and helped me up to the ward to wait for the surgery.

I chatted with the consultant and he said that the MRI had shown what they suspected, and there was a bit of bone floating about in my knee. What they didn't know was whether or not it was actually a part of the joint service or not. If it wasn't part of the joint surface they could just take it out through keyhole and leave me to repair, but if it was needed I would need to be opened up and have the bone reattached. The good news was that no matter which option they went with, I wouldn't be in plaster. I was incredibly happy to learn this, when I broke my other knee I spent the first 7 weeks in a full leg cast. I was barely able to move about and my leg muscles wasted away. The next 6 weeks I had to spend in a brace trying to rebuild my leg and regain my range of motion.

At about 09:30ish I was wheeled off to theater. The operation lasted for about 2 hours. I came to very quickly in recovery. The last time I had a GA I felt awful for days, being fit and healthy has some advantages! After a 5 minute shivering fit as the anaesthetic left my body, I was sent back to the ward. The recovery nurse was amazed just how quick I recovered.

Back on the ward I was still feeling absolutely fine. I had something to eat, and I tried to get myself re-hydrated. I was still in my 'cricket pad' splint, and wired up to an IV of antibiotics.

After a while the OT turned up and helped me into a new knee brace. This one has a dial to restrict movement to a set range. I'm currently allowed to bend my knee to 90 degrees.

The physio turned up next. Even though I was still wired into my IV and wearing my surgical gown (and paper pants), I was shown how to walk again. I was amazed. A few hours ago someone cut me open and screwed my knee together, and now I was walking again.

My range of motion in the left leg is still quite bad, and the leg cant quite handle full weight bearing yet, but I can walk. I am on crutches, but I'm happily walking about. The more I do, the better it's getting.

I hobbled round the ward for the rest of the afternoon, and was allowed home the following morning (after a couple more IV doses of antibiotics).

Szaf And The Fracture Clinic

Wednesday 19th August 2009

I had spent the week doing next to nothing. I had sat in my chair, only moving to get the odd sandwich to eat and to get more ice packs from the freezer. I think I had also eaten my body weight in NSAIDs. I really think that I should buy shares in Neurofen!

Wednesday morning, Phil took me to Royal Surrey hospital in Guildford for my appointment with the fracture clinic.

I was seen by the consultant; who said that, contrary to what the A&E doctor had told me, I had broken a bone inside my knee. He went out to look at my X-Ray and left me for about 2 hours sat on my own.

Eventually another consultant, who was to perform the surgery I had been told by a nurse I was having, arrived to say hello and to take a look at the knee. He had a poke and a prod and gave it the usual wiggle and pull to check the ligament. The diagnosis was that I had torn my MCL (I had guessed this from the lack of lateral stability I had since the fall) and also that the ACL had pulled a chunk of bone off the tibia.

I had a very similar injury in my other knee when I was a kid, from a football injury. So I had a pretty good idea what was coming.

The consultant said that I'd need to have an MRI the next morning and come back in on Friday for the op.

Not the news I wanted to hear, but at least I knew that I could recover from this type of injury and eventually get back to my hobbies.

The Accident

Friday 14th August 2009

Like most other Fridays Phil, Ray and I were bouldering at Craggy Island. Like so many other times I was trying routes too hard for me, and fell. Unfortunately, unlike all the other times I didn't land very well. My left leg touched down first at about a 30 degree angle. I continued falling and i felt my knee dislocated.

The next thing I knew I was on the mat with my leg folded under me. The knee was back in place, there wasnt much pain, but at the same time I could feel that it wasnt well.

Phil helped me to the edge of the mat and I tried to take stock of the situation. I poked and prodded around my knee and it felt odd, but mostly ok. I had a go at straightening it. This was a mistake, the muscles spasmed and they pulled the joint out again. I knew then it was a mess and it was hospital time.

The Craggy staff gave me some ice-packs, Phil and Ray helped me limp into Ray's wagon and it was off to A&E.

After some waiting I was X-rayed, seen by a doctor and told that it wasn't broken. I couldn't straighten my leg for a full range of ligament checks, but I was told my ACL was ok. I was put into a 'cricket pad' splint and sent home, to come back to the fracture clinic on Wednesday.

Maybe I just need to rest then, and I'll be back to sport soon.