Seven Weeks Post Surgery - Needing a Break

I mentioned in my last blog that my husband and I are planning a road trip later this month to ride some roller coasters. I am really looking forward to it. However, we tend to take two different kinds of vacations. We either are doing something like going Vegas, Disney, riding roller coasters, skiing or doing something else that requires a lot of energy and has us constantly on the go. While I love and crave vacations like that because they are so much fun, I also really feel like I need to plan the second type of vacation: a "veg" vacation. A vacation to detox, de-stress and unwind. A vacation for the purpose of doing nothing.

2008 has been rough on me. So I am hoping that all the funerals of friends, divorce announcements, threats of job cuts, and health and injury problems for both me and my family are finally behind me.

I am tired of the leg brace, tired of the therapy, tired of icing my knee, tired of the swelling, tired of the pain, tired of the whole routine. I need a distraction. Obviously, my last vacation (which was also supposed to provide some stress relief at the time) didn't work out so well since I ended up tearing my ACL and MCL and since then I've had surgery, non-stop physical therapy and have been wearing a leg brace for the last 84 days. EIGHTY FOUR DAYS.

So, this week, I have been pricing out vacations on the Sandals website. My husband and I have been to Sandals in Jamaica twice before (Ocho Rios and Whitehouse). So, why go back to Jamaica, AGAIN, rather than go somewhere new, you might ask? Here are my reasons:

• It's a short flight from Nashville. With very little travel time and without ever leaving our time zone, we can be in another country and feel a million miles away.
  
  
• Sandals is consistent. You know what you are going to get when you go there. The food is great, the drinks are great, the atmosphere is great. No tipping is allowed and there are lots of fabulous included activities if desired. You never leave there feeling like you didn't get your money's worth. If so, you didn't try hard enough.
  
  
• The Sandals website is having a sale. A good sale. A sale that AAA and another travel agent couldn't compete with when I was comparing prices.
  

• I like Jamaica. I like the people, I like the gorgeous beaches, I like the reggae music. It's obviously a country where the native people don't have much, but Sandals (owned by a native Jamaican man) gives back to the Jamaican communities and provides great employment opportunities for them.

I want to just book some time where there are no schedules and nothing we have to do except eat, drink and lounge on the beach. If we want to, we can hit their gym (gotta keep that leg strong!). If desired, we can spend a few hours snorkeling. However, if a day goes by that only includes sitting at the swim up bar for a few hours, taking a nap in the shade and then digging our toes in the sand while we watch the sun set over the ocean, I would be okay with that.

I wonder if I have a beach, some reggae music and some rum, if I can go for a few days and not even think about my knee. Will there EVER come a time when I won't think about my knee?

Six Weeks WIth My New Knee

Will my knees ever match like this again?

I've made it to the end of my sixth week, post surgery.

• I can finally (as of yesterday) bend my knee to 120 degrees.  Getting the bending back has been, by far, my biggest challenge.  Last time I saw my surgeon, he thought hitting 120 degrees by May 12th (my next visit with him) would be an aggressive goal for me.  I am SO pleased to have hit that goal ten days early.  It makes the hours upon hours of therapy actually feel worth the time and trouble.

• I still have to sleep in a straight brace and I can wear my bending brace during the day.  However, while I am at home around the house, I am allowed to walk (carefully) without a brace.  When I am without the brace, I find myself thinking about every step I take.  I really want to be able to bend my knee again when I sleep, but my therapist was hesitant to allow it just yet.  Something to do with tearing 2 tendons instead of just the ACL.  I will never take sleeping in the fetal position for granted ever again!

• I think that in about a week and a half (when I see my surgeon again) he will tell me I no longer have to wear either brace.  Although I am looking forward to that day, my brace has sort of become a "security blanket".  I know that my knee is safe in it, so it provides a sort of psychological security.  I've had a brace on my leg since February 10th (the date I tore my ACL and MCL), so the idea of not wearing one is actually strange to me now.

• I am really surprised by how well my scars are healing.  I've been religiously applying Mederma.  I don't know if it's helping or if I'm just healing on my own, but the scars are looking good.  I really thought they would look worse.  I remember showering the night before my surgery and looking at that knee thinking that it would never really look the same again.  While that is true, it's not nearly as bad as I anticipated.  I wonder how much more they will fade.

• Physical therapy has been going really well.  While it's painful sometimes, it's more of a healing pain.  I know that with the suffering comes healing--so it's very different from the pain of my actual injury.  Since my surgeon had me doing pre-surgery therapy, I have burned through my 20 insurance-covered visits quickly.  Luckily, my therapist has agreed to continue to see me and give me the one on one attention for just the cost of my normal co-pay and write off the rest of the cost as an expense.  I can continue to go twice a week until he feels I have received all of the treatment that would be necessary for my complete recovery.  I am so grateful.

• I find myself now wondering about the little things.  How long till I can just jog up the stairs without thinking about my knee?  How long till I can comfortably sit cross legged on the floor?  What will it feel like to run again?  How soon till I can leg press more than I could before the ski trip?  (Gosh, only 9 months till I ski again.  Strange to think about.)

I sort of feel like I've been in a cocoon since February--spending all of this time indoors, morphing into something else.  Morphing into a person with a "normal" knee again.  Trying to morph into a stronger person.  Trying to morph into someone without the fear of re-injury.  Trying to morph into the person I was before my injury and surgery--only better.  Hopefully, I am nearing the end of my transformation.  I have roller coasters to ride, walks to take, traveling to do, vacation time to use, pedicures to get and a life to get on with.  It's coming soon.  I can feel it.

P.S.  My first post-surgery roller coaster experience of 2008 is scheduled for the end of this month  (King's Island in Ohio).  I can't wait!