Monday, 31 August 2015

3 months post-surgery

This week marks 3 months since my ligamentum teres reconstructive surgery.

The scars are healed and starting to fade a little. I use BioOil every day and was told to press down hard on the scars when applying, particularly on the knee scar, to stop big lumpy scar tissue forming, and this has worked quite well. This is what they look like now. Could be worse!


I've been trying to keep up with the exercise bike/cross-trainer physiotherapy every 2nd-3rd day, and a 3km walk at least once a week. This is getting much easier. I don't really have much pain in my hip or knee now, just a LOT of stiffness. I still can't bend my knee back behind me though. You don't realise what those tendons at the back of the knee do until you get one removed! At night I still take Panadol Osteo, and some nights if it's really uncomfortable then I take Panadeine, but during the day I'm mostly OK without taking anything.

Over the last week I've been busy and only managed one session on the bike/cross-trainer, although still did a fair bit of walking. This week my left butt started to ache, just below where the top of my jeans sit, which is where I used to have most of the hip pain, and my lower back has been really sore so I was a little worried it was because I hadn't done enough physio this week. It turns out this happens to everyone at some stage, somewhere between 10 weeks and 6 months post-op. For some people it happens more than once. The physio said everyone comes in worried they've either over or underdone the physio, but it has nothing to do with it.

It's basically because the graft is really starting to attach, new tissue and scar tissue is forming, nerves are starting to re-form and it's all very tight because it's new. The physio tested the new ligament and it's all intact and working exactly as it should, so there's nothing to worry about. I'd been feeling a bit hunched-forward and that I'd suddenly developed a big duck-bum, but he did a little work at the front of my hip and also on the achey butt bit and it all suddenly loosened up and now the duck-bum isn't quite as pronounced!

Stairs are still a little difficult, and I find walking up a slope more difficult than on a flat surface. But I'm not limping any more so that's all good. I still get really tired much more quickly than before, but hopefully I'll start dropping some weight as the movement increases so that should help.

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Wednesday, 19 August 2015

Rebel Sport, "The Home of Netball" ... :/

Several months ago I wrote about a visit to Rebel Sport and our search for female sport authorised apparel - ie. netball. Rebel Sport did engage with my feedback at the time and while I often use this blog to make a point, I'm not generally the flag-waving protester type so I was happy to leave it at that.

Last week, however, I was lucky enough to spend 2 days with my daughter at the Netball World Cup 2015 in Sydney. Imagine my surprise on the first day when I saw this advertising, flashing around the court:


Wow! Really?! WTF?!

So, yesterday I visited my local Rebel, aka "The Home of Netball". We found the same rows of authorised apparel for men's sports, and we also found the same small netball equipment section (unfortunately under a "Soccer" heading but.. you know). Still no shoes but if I want a clipboard or a netball, Rebel's got it. So I asked a very helpful lady if "The Home of Netball" had any netball authorised apparel.

Success! There is now a single rack containing two of the official Australian Diamonds authorised tops!


Granted, a single rack is not the same as the row-upon-row of AFL, rugby, soccer, cricket and (men's) basketball merchandise, and it's kind of hidden amongst other green and gold (men's) stuff, and there is still no ANZ Championship/Vixens merchandise in sight, but still - progress. I'm calling that a (minor) win. :)

"The Home of Netball" lady said it was the first time she'd ever seen any official netball apparel in-store. I said I was rapt, and explained my previous search and she got on board and said she was going to discuss it with her manager. I asked her if more people requested it, would it help, and she said it definitely would.

So, get on board netball fans! Go down to your local "The Home of Netball" and ask about official netball merchandise!
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Monday, 17 August 2015

Netball World Cup 2015, Sydney

I was lucky enough to spend 2 days with my daughter at the Netball World Cup 2015 in Sydney last week. What an experience!

We attended Day 5 and Day 6 which were Qualification rounds, so we saw 6 games on each day, including the (now world champion) Australian Diamonds, NZ Silver Ferns twice and England's Roses play twice each.

Here are some of our pics:

Pretty happy with our seats :) (Even though my husband saw me on TV eating a burger doh!)


Em with the Netball World Cup trophy #NWC2015
The crowd was fantastic. We found ourselves sitting in front of the Scotland Thistles parents for one Scotland game, so we joined in cheering for #teamscotland. One of the lovely ladies even gave Em a Scotland wristband!

We have the Scotland team's mums sitting behind us for Barbados v Scotland game. Em now officially part of #teamscotland (for one game only!) :/ #NWC2015

We stayed at the Novotel, as did the NZ Silver Ferns, South Africa, Uganda and Samoan national teams, so we saw lots of netballers around the place! Em was very excited to share a lift with Maria Tutaia, NZ's 4th Centurion, who was lovely and kind enough to pose for a photo (even though we were wearing the "wrong" colours!).

And to cap off a great day.. shared a lift with Em's fave NZ player, Maria Tutaia! :)
The next morning at breakfast, we spotted Norma Plummer, ex-Australian Diamonds coach and player and current South Africa head coach. She was very happy to pose for a photo, and asked Em about netball, which position she liked to play and then eyed me and said to her "Well you look like you might get nice and tall - train hard and do what your coaches tell you and you never know". Not sure who was beaming more, Em or I!

Look who we ran into! Em with Norma Plummer, one of the greatest netball coaches ever <3 #NWC2015
FanFest was a lot of fun!

#NWC2015 Fan Fest with @emilycf3 #thingsyoudoforyourkids
We also climbed to the top of Allphones Arena to take this shot looking down at the court:


And here is Em "commentating" at Fanfest LOL:



All in all it was a fantastic experience, one we'll both never forget! :)
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Monday, 3 August 2015

10 weeks post-surgery - physio appointment

So there I was, feeling guilty that I hadn't done the swimming part of the physio list from 2 weeks ago, and had only just gotten up to the "starting" point of 10 minutes on bike/x-trainer... turns out, "I load people up because they usually only do 20-30% anyway". Ha! Nice trick, Mr Physio!

My hip has been feeling quite stiff, which is apparently a good thing. Apparently not having a lig teres means you get used to having an overly-flexible/wobbly hip joint, but having it feeling stiff is a good thing, and how it should be. Interesting.

The two biggest things to note at Week 10 are:
  1. For several years now, I've had chronic pain across my back and around the left side of my hip. Massage, pilates, walking would all help in the short term but it always came back. I barely had a night's sleep without Panadol Osteo. Now - gone. Completely gone. Lower back is quite stiff, hips are stiff, knees are really stiff - but it's the same on both sides.
  2. My knee hurts a LOT more than the hip. I can walk almost evenly, but going up and down stairs I turn into a creaky old lady. I'm virtually incapable of a simple bend at the knee to lift my foot up behind me.
Therefore, the task for the rest of this month is to keep doing the physio, and practice the knee bend every day. The goal is to do it 6 days in a row, without any pain during or after.

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