knee celebrates 4 month birthday!

While waiting for the bus to get to work, had a sighting that made me a lil envious...Still a ways til I can do this:

the rollerblading part, not the outfit part.  

May 24: 3rd post op appointment with Dr. Edwards.  I was able to work that day, so it was convenient to have my appointment when I'd be at NMH anyways.  The wait was a lil on the longer side, which made me kinda antsy.  I played with my stuff to stay preoccupied, here's one of my creations with my wallet wrist strap:

A lot of questions were answered once I got called in.  Dr. Edwards said my movement is great and was impressed with the notes Kim PT had written about my sessions.  I was still thinking a lot about this "cadaver" ligament.  She explained a lot more that I wish I had heard earlier in my recovery phase because things made more sense.  Basically, in the OR when she saw that my grafts would be too small to make a new ligament, she asked for the tray of donated ligaments.  Out of the choices, she took the one from the youngest donor, who was 26 years old.  Without the help of that cadaver, my ligament would only be 6mm in diameter.  Sooo, what she did was intertwine the cadaver ligament with my tendons to create one 8mm in diameter.   She even sketched it out for me.  She even drew the little nuk where the ligament looped up and around into, which made more sense as to why my incisions are the sizes they are and locations of them.  When the ligament is put in intitally, it is at its strongest.  But at about 3 months, my body realizes there is something quasi foreign in it, so it starts to act weird.  Hence, some iffy-ness with stability.  Balance and strengthening are what will keep my body from not hating it.  Also at this time, the combined graft with cadaver will learn to like each other and form a bond called KIRS' NEW AND IMPROVED LIGAMENT!  here is the copy of the sketch (she tossed the original):

I ain't no MC Escher

It's that upper outer "screw" that i feel the most scar tissue around.  Everytime I bend my leg/dangle it, I like to put my finger over that incision and feel the scar tissue crunch around in there.  I apply pressure to it while doing that motion hoping it'll break the scar tissue up in there.  Then I sing red hot chili peppers "scar tissue" in my head.  The incisions right on top of my patellas don't have so much scar tissue build up in there.  And the long incision is just puffy and quasi numb.  The last things we discussed were my restrictions.  I brought up running, she said not until July.  Thought about the business casual rollerblader and asked her about rollerblading.  she said NOOOO!  that's in the same category as tennis, hence, not til november :o(.  i was surprised just because Kim had started me on the reebok slide.  oh well, gotta stay patient.  Dr. Edwards said that the next appointment would be 6 months post op, but she realized i may be in California by then, so to make an appointment with her before I go.

With my amazing surgeon/knee doc, Dr. Edwards

While examining my horrendous scar, i tried to look at the positive of it.  it looks like a music note!  i know, it really doesn't, but let's keep praying that that scar will go down and the color will match my skin better.  i have a total of 6 scars on my left knee now.  can you find 5/6 of them in this pic?

separated at birth.

3 month anniversary

(another verrrrrry delayed post)

April 17, 2011- March of dimes walk!  This was my first true test to see how the knee would hold up for the 3mi walk along the lakefront.  My motivation was of course, was the babies.  were the babies?  anyhoo, here's on of them:

march of dimes walk '11, with my old primary, Shayna.  Born at 26 weeks, now 2 years old!

She came to the walk wearing the scarf I made her while I was bedridden!  Everytime I do this walk, it's a refresher as to why I do what I do and makes me appreciate my job even more.  It was great to reunite with old coworkers, NICU grads and their families, and the lakefront!  The last time I was on the trail was during a bike ride home from work late last year.  I noticed that they resurfaced some parts that definitely needed it.  I ended the walk with my coworker Janis and then headed back to the NMH tent for more baby fun

first 3+ mile walk after the surgery!

Here are more buddies who I took care of mostly in 2010- twins Abby and Lucy, and Shai!  All three of them born around 26 weeks.

me holding Lucy, Kari holding Abby.  Shayna's in the pink coat in the background walking around :o)

he's almost half my height at 16months! (his daddy's really tall). They were in nursery 1064 for most of his stay, hence the shirts :o)

Despite all the joy seeing the kiddos, when I got back home the knee was feeling it.  I think with the combo of the chilly weather and walk, the leg felt more stiff and puffy.  So, the rest of the day i was resting and elevating.  Here is an aerial view of the leg at 3 months-

scars are still dark...not pretty

 Kim let me take a 2 week haitus from PT so I could work and go to california for a week.  She said that since I do exercises outside of our sessions, she trusts that I will do them on my own.  I mentioned that Vince has a pool so she told me what kind of resistance exercises i could do in the water.  Made me feel better since I didn't think I'd have access to a bike or elliptical over there.

I prepared for the long flight by wearing my thigh high ted hose for the flight.  But being stuck in the same position in the middle seat for 4 hours straight was no fun.  I forgot to mention the lugging of the luggage down a big flight of stairs and back a big flight just to transfer trains. I did as many ankle pumps and thigh muscle contractions as I could to remind the knee to wake up.  It took a day to get the knee unstiffened with the help of stretching, foam rolling, and icing.  I needed to get it ready for Pat and Caroline's wedding that Saturday!  I used my creative juices to make my own balance routine too!  Here's the end product.  Secret thanks to Vince's roomie for contributing to it, hehe...

makeshift balance board at vince's house
I did the balance board while watching the royal wedding.  Geez, that Pippa stole the show!

After my 1st post op trip to California, came to home to celebrate nurse's week, May 6-12.  During this week we are thanked with little goodies, deals, free food, and more free food.  Here's a lil taste of how we were treated...literally (they were out of filet so i got ribs instead)

free din din at mity nice grill!  happy nurse's week!

The same week, Kim introduced me to a new/old exercise, the reebok slide!  I remember when Nancy Kerrigan was a spokesperson for this, and I always wanted to do it because she was one of my fav US skaters, especially after the Nancy Kerrigan attacks...WHYYYYYYY?

dippin my bootie covered foot on the slide!

I had so much fun on that thing!  The booties i had to put on my feet were just like the booties we wear in the OR for c-section deliveries.  Only, i'm walking on a much cleaner, less bloody, less poopie, more slippery "floor".  The focus was on the pushing off to get to the right side of the board.  It took a couple slides across to get used to it, but was able to do 2 sets of minute sets.

in action

While in California, I also tried to work core.  Vince happened to get the shake weight for a xmas gift.  I saw it lonely and laying on his floor, so I used it and learned to love it!  even though the infomercials target tricep/arm workouts with it, there's also a way to shake it so it works the core.  V saw that I loved it so much that he let me take it home!!!  Here's my new and improved "gym" in my room:

don't hate the shake weight!

Here's the 3 month post op profile pic.  I think the look of the knee has plateaued

it's the 10 week mark!

(verrrrrrrry delayed post!)

I don't know where the time went!  2 more weeks until the 3 month mark, the mark when many say is the shortest recovery time.  Does that make sense?  I hear 3-6months recovery.  anyways, I'm getting there!  PT is still going 1-2 times a week, same balance strength core exercises going on.  I'm just ready for faster movement!  I have to admit, it's nostalgic seeing all the runners outside, even on the treadmills inside.  I've had a couple days off where I was determined to be productive and clean out a lot of junk.  here's is the result of one of my closets:

to some this may still be a lot of clutter, but it's neat to me!

 The weirdest thing happened at my PT session today.  I was foam rolling my legs and doing hamstring stretches.  I looked down at my knee as i reached from my left toes.  When I get that close, I tend to become a microscope and inspect every little pore in my skin down to where a hair could possible sprout from.  On the distal part of my long incision, noticed a "hair" that had sprouted out.  Only thing was that it was a clear hair.  I'm a picker, so of course i form a tweezer with my right index finger and thumb.  I got to pull at the "hair" and the thing just starts coming out of my skin with ease.  This thing turns into a pretty long clear "hair" that finally ends after about 2 inches!  i was like, "what the frick?"  So i turn to Kim, she's busy writing notes.  Then i look back at what i've pulled out and realize i've just pulled out a dissolvable stitch!  In my head i thought, "oh my god, did i unstitch my leg? did i just do a really bad thing?" So i finally tell Kim about what I pulled out and show her, she said it was a stitch and that that happened to her too after her c-section.  phew!  This is what it looked like:

definately not a hair!

On the food front, I made multigrain pancakes, check out the butter slice shape!  i didn't plan it!

butta love

 I've found that my new bffs are medicine balls.  From 4lb-18lbs, i got love for them all

here's me and my 4lb bff.   i guess i like all things 4lbs...babies, medicine balls, melons.  Starting to get tired of my cardio options, so i try to enjoy it with the cardio entertainment.  Here's a dance video remake of Eddie Murphy's "Party all the time".  I found it quite amusing... so amusing that I had to pause my bike stroll to get this shot.  Homeboy looks like Dave Chappelle!

Seriously can't wait to have running as a cardio option.  There's only so much you can take when biking until your bum bum starts to get sore, no matter how much you shift on the padded seat.  Besides not being able to run, another frustration?  the weather!  here's a great depiction of what mother nature has been up to.  are we sunny are we gloomy? hmmm, let's be both!  arghhhhh

mother nature is bipolar