10 weeks tomorrow - and a picture!

Yep, 10 weeks! And you can take my lack of posts as witness of the fact that my life is returning to normal. I can now walk (fighting that tempting limp). Last night I went to my first yoga class since before surgery. This afternoon I biked down to the water (3 blocks away) and then a little way around the bay and back again. That was even easy :) I don't have my full range of motion back yet, but easy going... I'll get there.

Any PT-minded folks peering at this? If not I'll lay off the PT updates, but for now: still in the pool - walking forwards, backwards, and sideways, leg swings, abduction, adduction, squats and gentle jogging/jumping. This week I tried a gentle flutter kick down and back holding onto a kickboard and that wasn't too bad.

My only real trouble for now is that my tendon doesn't move smoothly over the 2 temporary screws I have, so anything that goes from dead straight to a slight bend (walking, stairs) annoys the heck out of it. The bonus? My leg doesn't get straight enough when I'm biking for it to be an issue!

speedy update

Seven and a half weeks out and life is good! I'm down to one crutch (pulled that off at 6 weeks and have been so busy since that the blog has been somewhat abandoned). My PT and surgeon are thrilled with where I am now. I've been working on one new party trick a day - Wednesday was driving :)

Today'll be the real test... 10 or 11 hours in a car... somewhat scary.

5 weeks and change

So the magic days have arrived. Yesterday I went to the pool down the street from our house during lap-swim time in the morning. (What an amazing place is that?!) I discovered they have one of those cool accessibility chairs that can lower you into the 3' deep section of the pool. In I went and started trying to figure out how to move forward again. My sweet mother came along to get me there and to act as a human crutch as needed, but I found I only really needed to lean for the first bit of time. Before long I figured out that I could still sort of propel myself forward on either foot. Very very odd feeling. And most of the time I was reminded of the Ministry of Silly Walks (mouse over the bits in that second link for the full effect).

In the evening I gave a go to a stationary bike for about 10 minutes and that felt pretty good too. No residual misery today aside from feeling like it's all been gently used. This morning I hit the pool again. Things are looking up!

And the next patient in the extended family is now just post-surgery. K came through her shoulder surgery with flying colors. (A will hopefully get a date for his knee surgery tomorrow.) She's now home being well cared for and spending hours sitting in her 'continuous passive motion' chair where I'm sure she'll grow bored, but at least the Vicodin is doing its job!

Anybody else out there scheduled for a knife? How can there be so many at once?

why I love designers

“…it’s an incurable, if not mortal disease. I can’t explain it. I just like looking at type. I get a total kick out of it. They are my friends. Other people look at bottles of wine or girls' bottoms, I get kicks out of looking at type.” --Erik Spiekermann (via Subtraction)

moonscapes

So I've been a little slow about getting my xray of my hip screws scanned in, but in the meantime I have other entertaining pictures for you!

Yesterday we had the ducts cleaned in our house. I was sitting at the dining room table finishing breakfast when I saw the truck pull up outside. I said peaceably to A, "They're here, and they're backing into your car." Adam went to the front door to let him in and then I saw him bolt outside - turned out the fellow really was backing into his car, or at least the back corner of it. I didn't think I was serious!

Once that was all sorted out (and with everyone still in good humor, though the man was looking a little undone by the whole thing) he got to work on the cleaning. They essentially attach an enormous vacuum to your vents in the basement, and then go room to room cleaning things out manually. About 3 hours later after running tubes all over the house and saran-wrapping a few vents here and there to help things along he was finished and came up to the living room where I was crashed out with my book and laptop. He handed me these before & afters:




That one on the bottom really is what it looks like - a wooden duct. We have one of those in the basement from way back when. The rest are happily metal. These are scary though, aren't they?

When was the last time you had your ducts cleaned? Worried now?

4 weeks out

Yep, 4 weeks today. Two more to go with the sticks which are getting nastier since I'm now up for trying to go greater distances. Like to the Art Fair on the Square last Saturday, which was great for making me feel like I'm back in the world, but rough on the body. As a result I spent Sunday on the couch and have been nursing my hands ever since. But they made me a balloon animal snail to attach to my crutch (unfortunately it only lasted about half a block before it popped), and a sweet volunteer couple watching a small table with some leaflets told me to come sit down for a minute and pointed to their three knee scars between the two of them from joint replacements. "We know what that feels like" - and they looked like they did.

And also traveling farther like back to work. I haven't gotten as far as busing in both directions yet, but I've done bus one way and a lift the other. I have to say that even with a bus route that goes directly from half a block up my street to the road right in front of the hospital it's still a rough trip. If I had to transfer I'd probably tell them I'd be another 2 weeks before returning!

Yay for University sick leave allotments though.

Why Man Creates (nope, not getting all philosophical just yet)

Brilliant.

Somehow the name Saul Bass never stuck with me, or I never even heard it go by. He's done close to 60 title sequences for films (lots of Hitchcock), movie posters, logos (one of the old really well known AT&T 'bells', the first AT&T globe logo years later, Girl Scouts of America). In short I should have figured out who he was a long time ago.

More samples of his work at the ever-present if somewhat untrustworthy wikipedia.

This is a 5 minute preview of a half hour short from the late 60s. I'd love to see the full length piece, but alas, Netflix hasn't copped on yet.

moitié/moitié!

3 weeks down, 3 weeks to go (well, on the crutches anyway). After that I can start working my way back to normal activity!

The thing about being out for surgery is that just about the time you're starting to feel better you get ideas about little things you could do to pass the time, but once you actually feel up to doing them it's time to admit that you should be thinking about getting back to work. I've still been crashing out mid-way through the day, and as often as not, dozing off during an evening movie, but I think I'll start trying a few short days at work again. You'd think a hospital would be good with all the accessibility, but it turns out that working in a city unto itself has some drawbacks. The main one is that you can travel an easy half mile just to get from one place to another in the building (door to office for example). Maybe there are more advantages to a 20 person office than I realized!

I've been working up to it though... took a crutch around the block the other evening, and getting back to playing my flute again (that didn't used to feel aerobic!).

For today it's Edward Scissorhands (I'm amazed that's been out for 17 years and I still haven't seen it), a shower, a nap, and then maybe going in to clear out the inbox at work this afternoon...

17 days post-op

Aside from getting generally exhausted when I try to do too much (like travel further than half a block or so) things are still going really well. I'm dreaming of things like a yoga class, or even just a short go on a stationary bike, but it's another 2 and a half weeks before I get to think about anything more than keeping my weight off the leg.

My latest good news is that the incision apparently looks great - really clean work. My nurse was all impressed when she took off the steri-strips this week. No staples, no external stitches. A longer scar than I expected but if the hip is better I'm all good with that. And I'm down to a Tylenol just now and again when I need it - not even every day.

At 5 weeks I get to start on a stationary bike with no added resistance, and water walking, and I can start putting about 50% of my weight on the leg when I use my crutches. At 6 weeks I get to start real PT and can ditch the crutches as soon as I feel safe.

I'm thinking I might try a half day of work toward the end of next week, and keep it up if it goes ok.

In non-me-related news (personal blogs are narcissistic anyway, but it feels especially so when all I'm doing is typing about how the aches and pains are going!): It turns out A's knee is well and truly toasted. He had his MRI this week and the ACL isn't even remotely still attached. He's still getting around fine for now as long as he doesn't look over his shoulder when he's walking but he's going in for a surgical consultation this week. At least the UW ACL repair docs are highly respected! We're hoping maybe for sometime in August so that I'm able to drive again before he's unable to...

Zoiks.

the ability to follow a thought from one end to the other

Sorry for the delay in posting - I was finally able to be up and out of the house and it's been brilliant. And exhausting! One of those odd situations for anyone reading though where you wouldn't know if the lack of communication was a total lack of ability due to a downturn, or if I just wasn't at the computer. I'm happy to report that for the most part I just wasn't at the computer.

Our good friends A & E were married on Saturday with great celebrations all weekend, just a few short blocks from our house in their newly acquired very long and treed back yard. It was a beautiful wedding and the food was great which is good news since it's the same folks A and I are planning to use for our own festivities.

This weekend I saw State St for a short while (and looked longingly up at the Kanopy windows). I went to Brennans (lovely fruit wine cheese fish market) where a sweet older woman asked me what happened and looked like she knew from experience how good it feels those first few days up and around again. And I completely wore myself out, but that's alright because it gave me the chance to feed my newly acquired addiction to the Canadian tv show 'Slings & Arrows.' I've now burned through all the shows from 2 seasons (12 episodes total). There's a third season which gets released on DVD tomorrow as far as I can tell from Netflix. Thanks, P, for the loan of the first two seasons!

Now that I'm clear of the drugs I can even read again. And keep track of the storyline between paragraphs. I knew my brain was fighting for it last week Monday when I tried the Washington Post crossword and it was hopeless. On a Monday! I'd hate to think the depression that might have set in if I'd tried a Friday puzzle. Today was much better for that so I think the neurons are firing again. Would I be scared if I went back and read my posts from last week? I'm just about finished reading The Dante Club, but I haven't seen it since before the surgery. If I can find that around the house today maybe I'll polish it off. I'm dreaming of the new Haruki Murakami novel After Dark. Right now I'm 34 on the library's list for it. If I could handle reading it in either Japanese or Korean I'd only be 4th or 5th on the list! In the meantime a copy of Anne Rice's The Witching Hour is sitting on our dining room table and I wandered a good way into the start of that over breakfast this morning.

As for a short medical update, it occurs to me that I haven't had a pain killer since getting up today, and I'm doing alright. After the misery of the narcotics I dropped down to a single extra strength Tylenol every 5 or 6 hours. The incision is longer than I'd expected, but it looks like it was very well put back together. I've been gently massaging it, and the nerve endings are still a little confused but not too bad.

It's been great to get to see those of you who have stopped by or who I ran into this weekend. I like solitude and miss it when I don't get any, but of course enforced solitude is something else altogether. So, thank you!

drugs, schmugs

It's amazing to me that the pain really hasn't been the worst of this thing. They tried me on a different narcotic - one that is supposed to be widely tolerated - and it was just as bad on my system. I don't think I was hallucinating but I haven't felt so sick with the flu as I did with the drugs. So that's it for me - Tylenol it is. Yesterday I worked my way through a fair bit of ginger ale and some crackers, eventually working my way up to rice - yippee!

For now I'm just looking forward to feeling well enough to attend my friends' wedding tomorrow, and I'm really bummed about a show tonight at Montmartre that I'd love to see, but other than that I think I'm on the mend.

8 days post-op

yuck

pain meds

yesterday was a particularly nasty day. Percocet and I don't get on well. That's what I'd been on since surgery and on Sunday I was finally able to piece together that the hallucinations were thanks to the Percocet. I kept dozing off and waking myself up a minute later talking to someone who wasn't there. That alone I might have been able to hack, but it was making me feel dead-ill besides... didn't want food, dizzy, nauseous. So I swapped out to Tylenol yesterday while I tried to get in touch with my doc, but it wasn't cutting it and I couldn't get through to him. Finally later in the day I caught a nurse who suggested trying a half dose of the Perc but that threw me back into feeling awful. Thankfully the nurse had a bright idea of mixing Tylenol with a benedryl which serves to make you sleepy enough that you doze off and your body can get back to healing itself.

Last night I slept for about 12 hours (not quite straight, but close).

Achy allover today but some swelling is going down a bit. Sick of the anti-embolism stockings.

But so glad to not have the issues from the Percocet. I made the same choice after my wisdom teeth were out and they gave me hydrocodone. Pain over drugs.

feeling human

4 days post-op and I'm actually feeling human! I took a shower for the first time today (bath-in-a-bag is great, but there's just nothing like a shower) and I'm off the anti-nausea meds. We learned they not only fix the nausea, but also make you dizzy and weak, and they block some seratonin production. In other words the faster you can quit taking it the better.

It feels nice to sit up for meals and crutch out to the back porch for some fresh air, and with the great weather I can at least have all the windows open.

Sorry for the lack of updates in the last few days but I've definitely been fogging in and out. In any case everything is going well, and I'm much more coherent now!

home safe

I'm home from the hospital and achy but doing very well. Halucinating a bit on the pain meds so I think I'll crash out and sleep for a while..

So far the only picture I have is an x-ray taken after the screws were put in. I'll post images I have available eventually...

the world needs more Lerts

I'm awake and alert (as of about 1:30 yesterday) and the doctor said the surgery went very well! In a nice twist they didn't do general anesthesia - an epidural and then just enough in my IV to keep me in a gentle sleep. I remember the first needle go and then I woke up in the recovery room.

The great thing about not being under general is that I don't really have an 'anesthesia hangover - no nausea and not too dopey feeling.

I spent the night fogging in and out of sleep with continuous episodes of CSI, Alias, and Angel.

Thanks for all your good thoughts!

toes

Life keeps you on them. Your toes, that is. A came home from his frisbee game tonight with a knee he can hardly put weight on! We talked to a nurse-on-call and she said to ice it and wait to see how it's feeling in the morning. Good thing we have a spare pair of crutches around.

surgery schedule

9:15 am - arrive at Stoughton Hospital

10:15 or 10:30 - into surgery

The surgery will last "at least 2 hours" and then 45 minutes in the recovery room.

1:30 - pretty much the soonest I can expect to be somewhat coherent. Maybe later if the surgeon finds extra cartilage junk to clean out.

The phone number at Stoughton Hospital is 608.873.6611

former patient

I've been going through bouts of being fabulously nervous about this whole deal, but I was able to do one thing that helped me feel better. My doctor's office arranged to let me talk with a former patient of my same surgeon. Trying to do that is the best advice I could give anyone going through a major procedure. I spoke with a guy who's 4 years younger than me and went through an open FAI procedure in late January. Before his hip went bad he was a baseball player (a right handed pitcher with a bad right hip) and running 10 or 15 miles a week. Now he's pitching again and back to running. He said at 6 and a half weeks he was walking without crutches or a limp and that he was starting to jog a bit within 3 months.

He also said Friday is going to be miserable. Apparently they usually give an epidural for this procedure in addition to the general anesthetic. The epidural has a 24 to 48 hour window of effectiveness, so waking up on Friday morning isn't so much fun. On the up-side he said that by Sunday he felt fairly human.

I'll be calling this afternoon to find out the actual time of my surgery. They expect that it will be in the morning, which would mean heading out to Stoughton Hospital around 6 or 7 and then leaving the next morning. I'll see if I can find out when they expect me to be coherent too...

reanimating, deanimating

This has truly been the great abandoned blog. To be quite honest I got a bit weirded out by the basic voyeuristic nature of personal blogs. I have been living plenty of my life in a somewhat public arena among my various artistic endeavors.

I think this summer might be a good time to bring some life back in to the abandoned blog. A few reasons:

1. (here's the deanimation portion of the title) I'll be basically stuck in the house for a good 6 weeks post surgery later this month and likely bored out of my mind with not much in reach but my pain meds, a big stack of books, regular doses of Netflix, and my laptop. Reaching out to the world out of my house gets appealing under these circumstances!
   
   
2. The reason for the surgery is something that is a relatively new (last 10 years or so) diagnosis and it seems most patients are desperate to learn anything they can from other people that are going/have gone through it. So for anyone who finds this and has been diagnosed with a torn labrum and FAI (femoral acetabular or femoroacetabular impingement) you can keep watching here and I'll feed you all sorts of details about my experiences with the diagnosis, the procedure itself and the progress of my hip's recovery. I'll be having an open surgical dislocation with femoral notchplasty. They'll burr down part of the ball of the femur, repair and reattach the labrum, and burr down part of the bone on the pelvic side of things. I'll even tag posts so you can ignore the non-hip musings.
   

For those of you who used to keep an eye on this set of musings, but don't get to see me very much or at all (or don't know me!) here's the update (admitting to that voyeuristic nature in blog readers):

In the last year I have...

• gotten engaged:
  
  
• bought a house:
  
  
• relieved the dying pan of its duties
  
  
• finally finished and released a third cd

So there you have it folks. My cortisone shot has been fading so my time here will likely be increasing as I make good friends with the couch!