First Steps

It's been thirteen days since my surgery and I've made (figurative) leaps and bounds since the surgery. Today I walked nearly a mile and have little to no trouble going up and down stairs, getting in and out of cars, and getting in bed. I am still on a walker for the majority of the time, but am able to use a cane to navigate crowded spaces and narrow passages (it turns out that the doors to 2/3 of the bathrooms I use on a regular basis in my house are not wide enough for a walker to pass through). It would be nice to move to a cane this week, but that won't happen until I can walk with a normal gait with my cane.

Below is a video of my learning to walk again.

If the above video doesn't work, try clicking this link to see a video of me taking my first steps.

I have been to physical therapy twice so far, but have been doing exercises they sent me home from the hospital with twice daily. I was surprised at how little I would have to go to PT but they said how many times you go to PT a week depended on your initial strength and that the daily exercises are where you see most of your progress.

In terms of pain, I have gone from 10 hardcore painkillers a day the first week after surgery to about 1.5 pills split up throughout the day. I hope to soon move to just Alleve as the oxycodone causes pretty serious drowsiness.

The range of motion of my hip is getting better and better. I don't think it'll ever be 100% back to what it was when I had a normal hip, but so far I have not encountered very many situations that I cannot get my hip in and out of.

There are 3 rules that I must follow for 6 weeks to prevent a dislocation or other catastrophic issue with my hip: 1) don't bend hip past 90 degrees, 2) don't cross my legs, and 3) don't turn my right leg inward (don't move my right leg in front of my left, don't rotate my right foot in too far, etc.). It has been easy remembering not to bend over, but remembering which way I can and can't turn my hip and not being allowed to cross my legs is really tough. To help get through the day with these restrictions, they sent me home with several tools. These aren't my exact tools but its the best I could find on the internet. The tool on the far right is this multi-use tool. I use it to put on and take off clothes, hook and pull things around the room, and in a sign of ultimate laziness, use it to reach the fan switch by the wall next to me like some bed-ridden obese person (it usually involves me banging it up and down against the wall until the switch turns). On the bottom is a luffa, which is just fabulous to use. Then above that is a grabber for when I drop things (which happens, A LOT). The thing in the middle is a sock putter on-er. Slide the sock on the right, slip your foot through on the left, pull the webbing and BOOM, your sock is on. It'll blow your mind. Finally, the elastic bands are to replace my tennis shoe laces. Yes, I now have new balance slip on shoes.

My long-term game plan is to fly back to Boston on July 30 with my friend Adam who will help me corral Bailey into a crate and wheel both Bailey and I through the airport to our flight. He'll stay for the weekend and then head back to Atlanta. And for me, I will continue PT in Boston. By that point, I should not really be using the cane anymore and should likely be going more much longer distances on the bike.

Oh, and one last note: one of my requests of the doctor came true. I asked the doctor to make me taller and it turns out that I'm about 1/4 to 1/2 inch taller on my right leg. They warned me this would be a potential side effect as placing the hip is more of an art than a science and is only an issue if I have my feet right next to each other (causing me to bend my right knee).