Thursday, January 26, 2012

First Follow Up After Surgery (Jellybeans?)

Today I had my first follow up with my doctor, Dr Prince. My progress is coming along quite well. We spoke more about what he had found in the knee since last time we spoke I was coming out of anesthesia. The loose bodies he found floating in my knee were roughly the size of a jellybean and I had multiples of them floating around. These pieces were particles from destroyed ACL and articular cartilage. No wonder my knee was hurting in multiple places, I had about 5 or 6 of these jellybeans floating around. Crazy to think I did a full Ironman with that crap floating in there. The worst part is that's not even what kept me from doing most of the run.

As for the progress, he said that is being more cautious on the front side thinking the back end of the recovery process will be shorter. His recovery process is not usually to have patients non weight bearing for a full 4 weeks but he is treating me different due to my athletic endeavors. He feels I recover very quickly and that my muscles have barely atrophied and by having me NWB for another couple weeks will help ensure a quicker recovery. So I'm not ruling out those Xterra's this year. No Louisville though, that's for sure. So now if I am getting dressed or putting shoes on I don't have to sit down to do it. I can stand on the leg fine and walk short distances with just leaning on one crutch but if I'm going longer distances walking I need both for at least another week.

As for training, I'm green lighted to go hard in the pool just nothing but freestyle. On the bike I can ride all I want just keep the power in recovery zone for now and next weekend I can start to bump it up. Then in 2 weeks or so I free to do anything I want. For running, he's leaving that up to my PT Clint. Clint is already planning on me running in the AlterG in a few weeks and we'll just go from there and see how it goes.

1 comment:

  1. It sounds like the outlook is good and that you have a doctor who understands your lifestyle. I need to find a new doctor who at least understands what running is let alone triathlon.

    Good luck with your continued recovery!

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