One week at Home

Below is a quick look at my knee as it is strapped into my CPM machine.  As you might be able to tell, the swelling is going down.  Even though my knee is finally beginning to resemble a knee again, the color is still pretty extreme.

Now that I have been home for a week...the routine for Melissa and me is now in high gear.  I would go as far to say that we are professionals at getting out of bed, hooking up the the CPM machine, and getting in and our of the lazy boy.

When looking at the bed I sleep on the left side of the bed...furthest from the bathroom.  We debated on switching sides of the bed, but that just seems unnatural.  Actually, we did debate over the idea and we found that it was easier for me to get out of bed by placing my good leg on the floor first- to help steady myself.  When getting out of bed, Melissa first places both hands GENTLY under my left leg.  She then begins to pick the leg up slowly.  As this is happening I slowly sit up, use my arms and my good leg to start pivoting my butt towards the side of the bed.  This is done usually with a couple of slides/shuffles.  We just aren't quite at the point to do it in one shot.  Eventually, I reach the side of the bed and place my right foot (the good leg) on the floor.  This is the moment that Melissa begins to lower my left leg towards the floor...I must say that my hamstrings are getting pretty flexible.  In the whole process, my left leg can never touch the floor or bear any weight.  Next, Melissa hands me my walker and begins to clear the path for me to get to the bathroom.  The entire process taking a couple of minutes and another 30 seconds to recover.  A process that use to take me just a couple of seconds.

Standing up isn't too painful as long as there are no weird tweaks in the knee.  Nevertheless, standing up does release all the blood in my body to flow to my foot in one sweeping second, creating moments of weird throbbing.

Each day I also face two things that have caught me by surprise.  One is that my body continues to have troubles regulating its body temperature.  Sometimes...I am hot and sweaty (at least that is how my wife describes me) and other times I have uncontrollable chills requiring three blankets and a yoga like focus.  Eventually, the arctic chills dissipate and the shakes turn to a normal calm demeanor.  The second challenge has been the nerve quakes.  At least that is the only way I can describe the weird pains and random quakes that roll through my bad leg.  I am sure there are two things to blame for the nerve pain...the nerve block and the large cut through my leg.  Over time these two things should leave and the leg will continue to move towards normal.

Tomorrow is going to be my first day out of the house.  I have my first post-opt visit with Dr. Tarlow.  I am looking forward to hearing what he has to say and continuing the long road to recovery.  More to share tomorrow.