Slowly But Surely

If the road to recovery is a long, lonely road, I think I'm on the wrong road.

My leg is getting much better. Better by the day, really. Yesterday it felt almost normal. The husband and I made a trip to one of the 637 (approximation) malls in the area to do some light shopping and as we arrived at the mall, I felt like a normal boy, at least at first. There was no serious limp, I could keep a decent pace, and in general was not in any pain or discomfort. Until about hour 2 or so, at which point I started to feel like I had recently had knee surgery again.

So three weeks after my surgery and I'm already seeing the potential for having a normal knee again. While I may not be healing as fast as the physical therapist would like, I am getting better and I can see that I will likely have a normal leg once again soon.

Stairs are still a problem, as is getting on and off the CTA busses if they aren't lowered (which they never do for me, which is why I always hope there's an old lady at the bus stop when I get there), but I think that's an improvement from "moving in any general direction is a problem."

There is probably still plenty work to go, but the good news is I'm not alone in doing it. My husband has been such a blessing during this whole ordeal because he allows me to push myself while accommodating me when I need it. My friends are great too, making some adjustments to our normal plans when needed.

I'm just looking forward to getting back to the gym, to be honest. I've put on a few of the pounds I lost recently, partly due to a more sedentary lifestyle, partly because I've allowed myself a few indulgences during recovery. But that'll change soon enough!

A Return Of The Work Mule

If stumbling around a train, falling off a bus platform, and getting shit shoved into a sore knee constitutes a healthy return to the commuter life, than I suppose I could say that I have rejoined the mass transit work commuters and gone back to work.

I've returned to work after two weeks off, and I'm questioning whether or not that was a great idea. Being at work itself is fine: I can prop up my leg, do a few exercises at my desk and even ice down my knee when needed, which is all nice. I don't have to do much walking around, and the walking I do have to do is not too intensive. But the commute… the commute is a bitch.

Being on a bus, then another bus, then a train for a hour and a half in the morning, then again at night, is not as easy as I thought it would be. People, I am often reminded, are dicks and don't care what is going on around them as long as they are comfortable. I'm trying to snag seats that allow me to prop up my leg or give me some room to stretch, but there are only so many of those seats per bus. When I don't get one of those seats, it is a universal certainty that a bag/arm/random sharp object will find a way to jab my sore knee. It's just lovely.

Not that I think driving would be much better for me. It'd actually probably be much, much more dangerous. The surgery was on my right knee, and trying to navigate brakes and gas with a leg that doesn't want to work 100% correctly is probably a sure-fire way to end up on the morning traffic report as that accident on the highway causing everyone else to be late.

Then again, if I didn't come back to work now, when would I have learned to use to my leg in the setting that I normally use it? Yes, walking around my apartment or downtown or whatnot provides some challenge, but the everyday challenges are the ones I believe I should focus on. So while this is all quite annoying, I am learning to use my leg again, which cannot be a bad thing.

But that doesn't mean I don't want to swing my gimped knee right into the ass of some jerk on the bus who's talking too loud on their Blue-Tooth earpiece while chowing down on a McDonald's breakfast and taking up an entire bench with their shit. A bench which I could use to not further injure myself. But what can you do?

Vlog: Gimp Knees, GMAT, And Maroon 5

Since I’m home from work this week, I have a little extra time on my hands.  Hope you enjoy!

The Busted Knee

I’m at home today, not at work.  Actually, I’m at home for the next week and a half.  At least.  Possibly more, depends on the pain and if I can walk again any time soon. 

What Happened?

I’m not exactly sure how long ago it happened, but my best guess is that about 2 years ago I hurt my knee.  I don’t recall I specific event or anything dramatic, but I recall having problems going that far back. 

My knee use to do something really, really neat.  When ever I would bend my right leg at the knee then straighten it out my knee would pop.  Audibly.  Loudly.  So much so that my husband and my trainer both told me I need to get it checked out by a doctor.  Eventually I caved and went to the doc with my magical popping knee and he came back and told me I had a torn meniscus.

Soooo… What Does That Mean?

Well, I have no idea what that “means” aside from what they say on Wikipedia, but I do know what that meant for me: knee surgery.  Also read: pain, no fun, no walking, or owie. 

The doctor and the surgeon agreed that surgery was the only option.  Luckily, they also agreed on microscopic surgery too.  All they needed to do was poke two holes in my knee, one for a camera and one for the tools, and go in and fix the nasty, rogue meniscus.

What They Actually Did

Saturday morning, the husband and I made out way to the surgery center.  I’m nervous as can be, my mother is motherly nervous, and my husband is perhaps the most nervous of us all.  They take me back, explain the procedure, knock me out, then a few hours later I wake up with lots of drugs in my system and a leg that doesn’t want to move.

It turns out that I did not have an actual torn meniscus though.  I had some other torn cartilage in my knee which looks like and acts like a torn meniscus, but it wasn’t the actual meniscus.  End result = same damn thing, but different.

Of course, they did all this while finding a way to freak out my husband.  At some point my husband asked the nurse what was going on with my surgery.  I suppose it was getting into the “taking too long” territory and he had not been updated on anything.  They told him there was a complication and I’d be in surgery for another hour and a half, which spooked him, then came back a minute later and said they thought he was asking about someone else and that I had actually just come out of surgery and they’d bring him back to see me in a moment.

So Why No Work?

After all that, the surgeon recommended I take at least a week off from work.  Not because my work itself is strenuous, but because getting to work would be a problem for someone like me that takes public transit and goes up and down stairs in the process while I only had the use of one leg.

It’s interesting.  I thought I might be excited to take extra time off work, but really I’m not.  I’m in pain, I can’t walk very well, I’m on Vicodin so I’m a little loopy, and I’m missing out on work that I’ll need to catch up on when I go back.  So I can’t really enjoy the time off.

But I do have to say that my husband has been taking care of me very, very well.  I haven’t needed to do anything on my own since I got back.  Hell, he even made lunch up for me today (since he had to go to work) so all I have to do is pop it in the microwave and viola!  I’m in the best hands!

What Now?

Well, nothing much.  Basically, I sit and wait for my knee to get better.  Today I’ll take off the dressing on my knee and over the next few days I’ll start trying to work my knee out and slowly start putting pressure on it.  Supposedly in “no time at all” I’ll be walking like normal again.

Does The Carpet Match The Drapes?

I'm in Cleveland for the weekend visiting my dad, who's getting surgery at the VA Hospital here. Now, I'm not saying that the VA Hospital really worried my at all, but... well, this is how gay I am. I saw this rug in the middle of the social area and realized that it was probably purchased in 1991, and it looks like it's been walked on since then.

Now, I'm sure that the hospital is just fine, and their surgeons are quite competent, but when I see that the organization that plans on operating on my dad hasn't updated their accesories in over 15 years, it makes me wonder if they've updated their surgical procedures in that time frame...