Post Surgery Followup and Plans

I had my Plantar Fasciotomy on November 21st.  I think I hold a record or something because people are amazed that I voluntarily had surgery on my birthday.  My feelings were: What else do I do for excitement at my age? and I get four days off from my primary job with pay that I can use to recuperate because of the Thanksgiving Holiday.

Surgery went well and my sister drove me home to start the recuperation.  I was placed in a surgical boot and basically climbed into my bedroom to hide the next couple of days, only emerging to show up to Thanksgiving dinner for an hour on Thursday.

Not a lot of pain - for which I was grateful.  Just one really nasty bout of nausea the first night - which led to the joys of cleaning up my carpeting because I couldn't crawl quite fast enough to my garbage can.

I tried to stay off the foot as much as I could the rest of the week and used crutches or a crutch to help keep the pressure off.  I did work a lot on my second job starting on Friday - but actually took two full days to relax and rest.  I even got bored enough to go through my Amazon Kindle account and delete 150+ books that I had already read and wouldn't reread or didn't plan to read.

Fast forward to today.  I had my post surgical follow-up with Dr. Royall.  I did chew him out for not giving me any post surgical instructions and he admitted he messed up there. Luckily - this was foot surgery number 3 on the left foot and I was a pro at knowing most of the routines.

Dr. R removed the stitches and showed me that there was good "squishiness" in the Plantar Fasciia - which is a good sign.  Normally he only uses the needle in a surgery between 1 minute 45 seconds and 2 minutes 30 seconds and he had to work on me for 3 minutes 30 seconds because my Plantar Fasciia was pretty solid from scarring.

We discussed my theory that trying to switch this year from a heel striker to a midfoot striker probably aggravated underlying conditions and caused this injury.  I'm going to go back to being a heel striker and proud of it. It worked for me for 7 years.  I shouldn't have messed with it.

Next Steps

Dr. R seems to know I need to be told specifically what I can and cannot do.  Here is the plan for the next little bit:

• Wear the boot for 2.5 more weeks.  I can start wearing a shoe with my orthotic on December 17th.  Still not supposed to walk more than necessary (yeah - life is really cooperating with that).
• Starting on December 17th, I can slowly walk one mile a day. No running and not much more than that.
• Starting next Wednesday I can swim as much as I want as long as I don't push off with the left foot.  I think I'll throw pool running in.
• I can ride a recumbant bike as much as I want - but not on heavy settings.
• I can start doing core and upper body weight lifting - just can't do any that require standing or putting stress on the foot.
• I did get permission to go to the New Year's Revolution Run - but am limited to two hours of easy walking and no running.

Time to start eating healthy and use the month plus off to get off the extra weight, so running will be easier when I can start up.

More Stress

Of course, after being told to stay off my foot as much as I could, my son called in the afternoon in serious pain thinking he tore his rotator cuff as he pulled off his shirt.  With his dad out of town, I rushed up to Woods Cross and got him to a doctor.  Lots of praying on the way up there - we really didn't need another surgery on top of mine.  I was so relieved when he came out with a sling on and said it looks like a serious sprain.  

I decided I needed to get a few groceries. I'd been hoping earlier in the day my son could help me - but he was in worse shape than me and I dropped him off at his house to rest. 

Naturally - the motorized cart I picked had a dead battery and some woman who was walking really well grabbed the other one.  Had to hop around Smith's with my foot on a grocery cart - that didn't make me happy and I only got a few groceries to carry me through.

Need an Easy Button

Just kidding.  A friend of mine wrote a blog post yesterday on how so many people want things easy in life.  Check it out here at ireaderreview.

I wonder if some of the issues with my foot this year have been a result of my taking things too easy.  Four years ago I was in about as good of shape as I can recall. Heck, I was working 2 days after a hystericalectomy and running after two weeks.  But then I got lazy and quit spending time making sure I ate healthy and regained all the weight I had lost.  I don't organize menus and I don't cook healthy meals.  I'm not going to let myself be lazy in 2013 - I can't wait to see the changes.