Turning a Corner

Last weekend i had to take big jump backwards to move forward again. But, its working! Going back onto two crutches helped my hip settle down. The pain subsided and the loose feeling mellowed out. I'm back to alternating between one and two crutches - but I feel i'm close to losing the sticks completely. Yesterday in the pool i did some waist deep walking and felt incredibly different than I had just last week. I could take a full forceful stride without a lot of pain (just a small pain in the hip flexor, which is still weak). I could stand and balance on the one leg. TFL is getting stronger. I know, little things, but huge progress.

I also got back onto my regular road bike (on the trainer) rather than riding the stationary bike. Clipless pedals, bike shorts, my goodness, it feels strange. But so good to sweat. I only rode for under an hour, and if I had a power meter on i'm sure it would be laughable, but I'll take it. I'm hoping the sun will start shining around here and in the next week or so i'll be able to get out on the road and ride a few times before the next surgery.

Speaking of which, the next surgery is just over 3 weeks from now. I'll be driving from Denver to Vail in exactly three weeks. Boy am I ready. As I'm starting to do more, my right hip has started to have the familiar pains in the front, back, side, allover basically. So, any doubts or feelings of "i can just live with it" have left. Its going to be a long wait, but this wait will be sweet, because it will be the last wait. Enough with this year and all of my pieces falling apart.

I have a lot to rebuild in terms of strength. I did a plank yesterday, and I lasted about 10 seconds. I used to do those for minutes, repeats. I'm sore today too. But hey, I'm excited to just be able to do it and not have my hip or my clavicle limiting me. My biggest challenge will be to have patience, and not do too much too soon. Last thing i want is another injury.

3 weeks to surgery, 3 weeks in Vail, probably another 2-3 weeks until i'm where I am right now on the other hip. I'm expecting and hoping that the next surgery won't need a reconstruction and that it will be less difficult. If my timeline is right, that means in less than 10 weeks I'll be on my bike. That seems almost ok!!

2 Steps Backwards

Bad news. Back on 2 crutches and hip is feeling loose. Crappy combo. Its been a rough few days. Walking on one crutch was a stretch - but it was so much more convenient and felt like "progress" so i kept going. Only, it was getting more and more painful, which is not the goal. So, back onto 2 crutches based on the reality check from my PT. If I'm walking like a pirate with a peg leg, either get an eye patch or bring back the second crutch.

This week was also the first week of adding external rotation and extension. I hadn't been allowed to do that for the first 5 weeks in order to let the joint capsule heal up all nice and tight. This was because of the looseness I had been feeling after surgery. So, I'd worn the damn hip brace for 5 weeks. I hadn't taken a full stride for 5 weeks. And had slept in the damn foot boots with my feet strapped together for 5 weeks. All sucky annoying things that I did, thinking it would pay off in the end. Things seemed to be going well. Tightening up. Less and less incidences of looseness. Well, its been 3 days of freeing myself from those restrictions and the looseness is back. Wonderful. Very discouraging.

I have an email in to my dr. people to see what their advice is.

Meantime, icing and advilling and blogging :)

happy saturday folks.
v