New Stryde Diary 2018 - with Dr. Paley

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lmao that pain would be a 12/10

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POD 9: spoke too soon. Woke up this morning and there’s an intense painful ache on the lateral portion of my thighs with left leg hurting more than right. I would call it an 8/10 ache.  Took an oxycodone and waiting for it to go down.  Also, it looks like all the internal bleeding is now surfacing.  My legs post procedure had some bruising but not a lot, today the entire lateral side of both legs are bruised and distinctly purple.  Also the thighs are more swollen today, when I push down on them it creates divots in my skin.  I’m assuming all this is normal because I actually can ambulate with walker fine.  Hopefully this is the peak of the swelling and it only goes down from here.  Otherwise appetite is good, eating 2000-2500 calories a day (my normal is 1500-2000) ,  not because I’m forcing myself to, but because I’m always hungry right now.  I’m also supplementing my food with the vitamins as described previously.

POS 10: strength is doing much better and I can walk somewhat normal without my walker.  The issue is I have weakness in my hips and that’s also where the pain is coming from.  When I lay on my side to Do lateral leg raises it hurts like crazy and that muscle is really weak.  My PT told
Me that once this muscle strengthens and loosens back up, it will normalize my gait. I am going to start working hard on this muscle.  The PT also told me that I am
Going to either be in crutches or transition to cane next week .

POD 11: there’s a constant 8/10 pain that’s on the lateral side of my leg and it’s brutal, super achy. My right legs has no pain. I’m using all my pain meds at my disposal.  I’m not sure if this is just my muscle being overworked, or I sprained something stretching. Have my follow up appointment coming up soon and will ask Dr. Paley then. Also I tried going to the gym today and it was a freaking disaster. I mainly did machines. Did chest, back, and arms.  I could only lift 60% of my pre surgical max, but what’s worse is I kept getting thirsty and all of a sudden I had full body sweat and almost fainted.  Guess my body wasn’t ready yet and all the energy is still going into my legs to recover.  The last two days has def been my worse pain days since surgery.

POD 12: holy crap pain pain pain. I think the last few days a lot of muscles are starting to be more active and causes an intense ache.  The worse are my ITBs and piriformis.  Having a lot of problems sleeping at night and I’m on oxycodone almost very 4 hours.. hopefully this past soon. My quads and hamstrings has zero pain, my “femur” pain if you will is zero as well, pain is more in my butt , hip muscles, ITB, and piriformis area.

POD 13: the intense pain is still present. The pain is only on my left leg, my right leg has zero pain. The pain is no longer located on the side of my leg or behind my leg, it’s now located in my inner thigh.  I can feel a muscle inside my leg that’s super tight and possibly in spasm - likely that’s the cause of the pain. I’m assuming that all this is just muscle pain and hopefully it’ll pass soon. As of right now I am taking 1000mg of tylenol as well as the prescribed oxycodone. This pain is worse than the post surgical pain. I just hope it’s not something more of an issue as my right leg feels completely normal.  I had my aide buy a bunch of those icy hot stickers along with cold packs, and this combo along with Tylenol and oxycodone has helped me a lot. I can’t wait for my left leg to feel like my right, this pain causes me to lose sleep

Summary:
- don’t forget to buy big baggy gym shorts, easier to put on when you have deceased mobility and soreness
- Although I’m now working from home I really only get in 3-4 hours a day max. Between PT (1.5 hours round trip), your own stretches 4x a day (1.5 hours) , using the lengthening machine, and just generally taking more time to do everything because you’re limited because of inability to walk.  So if you plan to work 9-5pm it’s really hard to given everything else you need to do for yourself.
- Wound care:  I’ve read all over the internet and consistently there’s one best way to prevent scars.  During the first two weeks you must keep the wound moist, which allows it to heal faster and better.  You do this by applying petroleum jelly to your wound.  Then cover it with bandaids.  Make sure you shower and clean the area with soap and water at least once every 1-2 days to prevent infection as covering the wound with a moist jelly will put it at risk for Infection .  Once initial healing is done, apply mederma anti scar cream to it to slow/prevent scar tissue formation.
- EASILY the best item that I’ve bought so far was a foldable laptop table stand for your bed, I eat on it, and also work from, it, you can lay down flag and tilt it, and place your MacBook on it.  I’m able to work super comfortably with this table.  Post op wise, when sitting in a chair, it irritates your leg, so this table allows me to lay down and prop my leg up on two pillows
- When you’re in the hospital, ask the nurse to put you on the “Polaris” cooler machine, it’s two cooling pads that wraps around your leg.  This will help reduce swelling,  you can also take it home.  It’s basically a machine that pumps ice water into the pads (you replace the ice water every 4 Hours) — really takes the pain away.  I’ve had to use it a few times since I got home.
- Buy ice packs and those icy hot sticker pads, super helpful for random muscle pain !

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Sounds harsh. Are you doing this by yourself?

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Sorry to hear that. Did you do something which caused this pain...my idea what it could be from?

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What kind of PT are you doing? I'm having troubles with my knees, it's like their frozen for a good 5 minutes until I get them warmed up to move. I'm also having limited range of motion when walking and going up/down stairs as they only bend a bit. I'm about 1 month in as well.

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POD 14: Pain is completely gone.  I spoke to a lot of the PTs and they all said it was from muscle strain.  Other than some minor aches now (feels like you walked disney land all day and sore at the end of the day), I literally have 0 pain.  I'm also on crutches now...what a whirlwind the last 4-5 days.  I was just reading MyEvolution's diary and he's absolutely right, where he said week 1 was easy, week 2 as an absolute nightmare.  I'm starting week 3 now so hopefully none of the pain comes back.  For PT, i'm doing the regular Paley institute PT and a lot of stretching on my own at home using a stretching strap.  Everyday I see significant improvement in ROM.  Right now my knee has full flexion, my Hamstrings can go 90 degrees when I lay flat, but my IT Bands are horrid - laying flat, I can't bring my legs together, I can feel it really tight on both sides, I can't lay flat and put one leg over the other at my ankles either.  Also my hip rotators are super stiff, I can't sit with my legs crossed or "indian style." I am going to focus on these two muscle groups the next 1-2 weeks and hopefully it starts to give. 

In terms of ambulation, I feel like I'm going to be able to walk without crutches in less than a week, when they switched me to crutches, it felt really natural and easy to walk.  I have a feeling I'll be on a cane soon.  Keep you guys posted.

PS I see a lot of stryde patients at PT, and their gait looks completely normal, saw a guy at about 7cm and he was on the treadmill warming up, if he didn't have a cane I wouldn't be able to tell he had any surgery done, that's how normal his gait looks.

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Quote from: cool on October 31, 2018, 04:28:09 AMSounds harsh. Are you doing this by yourself?

Hey - no way, during my first 5 days out the hospital I had an aide 24 hours a day, now I just have a daytime aide.  I would say, the first week or so out the hospital you 100% need someone to be with you 24 hours a day, your legs are simply too weak to do anything yourself.  After that, it’s more for convenience.

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Ah ok. But you're still alone (like no family/friends?)

And can you please post a walking video and some picture perhaps? Thanks!

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What does the normal Paley PT entail? I'm just curious because I'm doing limited stretching, toe touches in bed, and achilles stretches on stairs. I'm trying leg raises as well but not showing too much improvement...

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Quote from: jcayabo on November 01, 2018, 09:14:02 AMWhat does the normal Paley PT entail? I'm just curious because I'm doing limited stretching, toe touches in bed, and achilles stretches on stairs. I'm trying leg raises as well but not showing too much improvement...

first 10 mins: they put you in a NuStep machine where you just push down with your legs, almost like a recliner stair stepper.  This warms up your quadricep

Next 30 mins: you do a series of exercises to warm up your muscle. 
1) Straight leg raise , one at a time , 3 sets of 10 laying flag
2) While sitting with your back straight, you kick out , 3 sets of 10 for each leg
3) Leg slides, you lay flat and they put a sliding board underneath your leg, and you go from laying flat to bending your knees, 3 sets of 10, each leg

Last 20 mins spent stretching:
1) Thomas Stretch (you can look this up)
2) Hamstring Stretch
3) Knee mobility stretch (you lay flat on your stomach and they behind your knee from the back)

The above changes as you progress, they are now doing side leg raises on me and we no longer do the knee mobility stretch (i still have to do it at home but not enough time to do it in the 1 hour PT session, so they want to focus on things you need during that 1 hour)

Good luck!