Monday 29 June 2015

Hip reconstruction - physio and pool-rehab begins

Day 29 - Second visit to the physio today. I'm now allowed to start "weaning" myself off crutches at home over the next 2 weeks, although I still have to use them when I go out. I remember from my previous procedures that having crutches means most people are cautious and will stay out of your way!

I'm also allowed to start walking in the pool. Swimming is also OK, as long as I use kickboards and don't kick at all. Which is more like dog-paddle than swimming, but whatever... :)

Favourite conversation from physio visit:
"I need to do something, I think I've put on 5kg in the last 4 weeks just sitting around eating crap".
"Completely normal, don't worry about it, the weight will come off when you start rehab".

Yay! :)

Day 30 - First day of pool-rehab. "Walk in the water for no more than 10 minutes". "And if you want to do some arm exercise, use a kickboard/noodle/buoy under your body/legs but NO kicking or leg movement, and no more than 10 minutes".

Sounded easy at the time, but ERK - think a nana-nap may be on the cards this afternoon... :/ #coffeetime #hipreconstruction

Met some lovely senior citizens down the "walking in water" end of the pool. Fun times. :)

Day 31 - Next challenge completed! ‪#‎stairs‬ ‪#‎day31‬ ‪#‎hipreconstruction‬ ‪#‎ligamentumteres‬ ‪#‎recovery‬
Next challenge completed! #stairs #day31 #hipreconstruction #ligamentumteres #recovery
Day 35 - Always entertaining visiting a public pool on crutches. Tonight's classic from a very nice, limping senior citizen in a booming voice that I'm sure the entire establishment could hear - "G'day love - hip or knee?!" Last week I was given the number of "a great hydrotherapist who specialises in senior... err... well, never mind, I'm sure she'd see you too!" ‪#‎expandingmysocialcircle‬ :/

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Monday 22 June 2015

Hip reconstruction - recovery, week 4

... See previous post - Hip reconstruction - recovery - week 3.

Day 24 - Follow-up visit with surgeon today. He seems very pleased. He said that in many orthopaedic procedures, situations arise which need to be dealt with, but my procedure was "text-book". Yay!

He gave me some photos taken during the procedure, which don't really mean much unless you know what all the bits mean. But what he also explained was something I wasn't clear on before - how the tendon is actually bolted into the bone. I had a visual of drilling a hole halfway in and then somehow fixing one end of the tendon down inside. But no - they drill all the way THROUGH, and bolt it on the outside! A bit like an ACL (knee) op - here's a picture of what THAT looks like:


(There are no images like this of my hip procedure because it's still so new).

Day 26/27 - Managed to get out of the house to watch my son play sport on Saturday morning, and to watch my daughter perform in a festival on Sunday morning. Then needed nana-naps in the afternoon. Crutches/recovery is quite tiring...

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Monday 15 June 2015

Hip reconstruction - recovery, week 3

Warning - graphic images.

... See previous post - Hip reconstruction - recovery - week 2.

Day 15 - I have so many lovely friends, lots of visitors. :) :) Visited physio for the first time. "What have you been doing so far?" "Nothing! Bored!" "Good, keep doing that, see you in 2 weeks". #sigh

Day 16 - Healing... bruises are starting to look old and not-quite-so-gross:


Day 19 - Finally able to drive again! Not very far though, it hurts to sit for very long - just enough to pick kids up and drop them off!
Can finally drive! Even if I can't get out :-P #day19 #hipreconstruction #ligamentumteres #recovery
Day 23 - Hip is starting to look quite neat but the knee wound is still a bit messy:
Hip (left) looking better than the knee at the moment! #day23 #gettingbettereveryday #hipreconstruction #ligamentumteres #recovery
Week 4...
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Monday 8 June 2015

Hip reconstruction - recovery, week 2

Warning - graphic images.

... See previous post - Hip reconstruction - recovery - week 1.

Day 8 - Some lovely hip bruising and nice bandages:
Nice bruising eh?! #day8 #hipreconstruction #ligamentumteres #recovery
Day 10 - Have had some lovely visitors but not entirely sure what I said to any of them - Endone and Tramadol make me very drowsy! Visited GP this afternoon to get the sutures out, only to discover they are dissolving sutures inserted under the skin and therefore can't be removed. She removed all the dressings though and said it looked really good. I thought it looked hideous but I've never been good at gore... :-/

Day 13 - Happy Birthday to me! It took several hours to get up, fed, showered and dressed but I managed to get out of the house for a birthday lunch with husband and kids. Then back home to bed.

Week 3...
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Monday 1 June 2015

Hip reconstruction - recovery, week 1

Warning - graphic images.

... See previous post - Hip reconstruction - background.

I was lucky enough to be scheduled first thing in the morning - yay! I'd sat around fasting until after 3pm for both of my previous arthroscopes so I figured I'd done my time! However, the physio had told me there were some highly skilled orthopaedic surgeons visiting from Europe who were quite excited about my procedure and would probably spend 5-7 hours taking notes afterwards, so I suspect the timing may have been more about them than me... oh well, whatever works!

Mr O'Donnell visited in the late afternoon and said it had all gone really well, and was the smoothest procedure he'd done so far. Yay! He said he'd also cleaned up the hip capsule and tightened up a few things, and shaved some bone to make it smoother. Yikes. He advised me to take it very easy as the graft needed time to attach properly, and to do everything the physio said.

Here I am the night after the surgery, clearly drugged to the eyeballs LOL:
All done! Home tomorrow. Thanks for all the messages of support :) <3 #hipreconstruction #ligamentumteres #recovery
Day 5 post-op - Due to the tendon removal from the knee, I'd had a lot of swelling and developed what my friend described as "cankles" - by day 5 it had started to resemble a real ankle again:
Hello, ankle! Nice to see you back! First time it's been smaller than my thigh in a week. Knee & hip still disasters though :/ #hipreconstruction #ligamentumteres #recovery
Day 7 - I can move around on crutches very slowly but I keep getting dizzy and feeling faint so I'm supposed to just take it easy.

Week 2...
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WEB310 - Case Study

For WEB310 - Web Play, Online Games and Gamification - we had to create a Case Study.
create a media artifact containing a case study introducing a game or game genre to a general viewer/reader.
Here's mine: http://prezi.com/hdpxfi6relwg/
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