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Rehabilitation Avenue |
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Team Bikeman -
Race Reports
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Written by Mary Longhofer
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Tuesday, 17 April 2007 |
The long, hard road called Rehabilitation Avenue
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Rehabilitation has felt more like a cul-de-sac than a steadily forward moving avenue for me. Around and around I go. The last time I did a post regarding my hip injury was back in January. At that time, I was hoping to avoid surgery on my hip. Unfortunately I didn't avoid surgery and underwent an open fixation of my hip on January 31 at my work place, Orthopaedic Associates Surgery Center.
In the process of being diagnosed with my hip fracture, my doctor discovered that I have an osteochondroma of my proximal femur, very close to the femoral neck where my fracture was. An osteochondroma is like a cartilaginous area, which results in a soft, weaker area on the bone, not quite what one wants in a bone, particularly on a weight bearing bone such as the femur. This area caused my surgeon some alarm in a straightforward pinning (which would have resulted in 2-3 narrow screws and a small incision) of my hip, as he was concerned I might fracture at the osteochondroma area after my hip surgery. So, to protect my femur from potential fracture, I ended up with a plate and 2 screws in my femur as well as a 4" screw into my hip to fixate the present fracture. Now I have a bunch of stainless steel (unfortunately not titanium!) hardware in my hip. See new hip photograph.
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So, the immediate recovery following surgery was not all that bad. I was able to legally to take some fun drugs, which I discontinued the day after surgery thanks to them doing a number on my stomach. I was able to walk without crutches, with not that bad of a limp about 5 days later. The incision was the most painful area understandably as I ended up with a 3" incision on my outer thigh with a lot of swelling vs. the hoped for 1" incision. My staples came out 7 days after surgery and my rehab. including physical therapy began 2 days after that. I returned to work about 10 days post op, which in hindsight was probably a bit too quick.
My rehab. initially started with short easy spinning on the bike, strengthening to build up muscle mass lost after 6 weeks of non weight bearing, and working the soft tissue around my incision area to avoid unwanted build up of scar tissue. Within a couple of weeks I was up to spinning for 30 minutes on the bike, doctor approved. By about six weeks post-op I returned to yoga class. Things seemed to be progressing pretty nicely, outside of expected pain from the steel in my hip, which my surgeon has told me to give a good year to adapt to (yikes, a year?!). Then about 3 weeks ago I developed hip/groin pain again, very similar to what I experienced with the fracture. I tried not to panic and saw my dr. a few days later after it didn't go away and had x-rays repeated. Everything looked ok, so the consensus was that I needed to back off from what I was doing (not that much in my book, as in not even close to riding every day and certainly not back on the trail and only on road once). So, back off I did and practiced more sofa surfing and DVD watching, which I could easily be classified as a professional at, at this point. So much so that I've expressed concern to teammates over being in serious competition with J. Lo for having the bigger back side, and I'm not referring to the kind of glutes one really desires!
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Anyway, so it goes and after a couple of weeks in the land of sedentary AGAIN, with the exception of long 9-10 hour days on my feet at work (decidedly not helping my recovery), I'm feeling encouraged again. The pain has abated a bit and I have realized that the goal of racing this year absolutely cannot drive my desire to get fit again. I have to takes things even slower and easier than I originally hoped and thought. I was doing a pretty good job of minimizing the severity of this injury and I think just in the last two weeks it really hit me. (I've always been a top-notch student at the School of Hard Knocks.) The strain of this entire experience - being sedentary, not being able to do basic things for myself, feeling pain on a daily basis, not doing things I love and live to do - has been very wearing. But I continue to remind myself that this too shall pass, eventually, and that many lessons (including ones I'm struggling with) will be learned. People keep telling me that I'll come out of this stronger. I have a hard time imaging that with my deteriorating fitness level, so I guess I will perhaps have to prove that I will and can.
Today I got on my bike again for the first time in three weeks and took an easy spin over to a friends' house and ran some errands. It was raining and cold but I didn't care. I felt free again! And the feeling of being back in the saddle never felt so good. So, as I daydream about the single track trail and being back in the saddle of my mt. bikes that have been gathering dust, I remain hopeful that soon we will be reunited. And that I soon I will also experience the Zen of the road again, especially on the spring rides that I miss with my Bikeman.com compadres.
I will part with a few final words, those of Confucius - "Our greatest glory is not in never falling, but in rising every time we fall." This pertains to life on so many levels. And in this difficult situation that I've recently been face with, whenever I get down, I pull (sometimes drag..) myself up the boot straps and cling on to that inner knowing that I will get better and that I will rise again.
So, my friends...drink your milk, take your calcium, do your weight bearing exercise (...see previous post about bone density), keep your chin up, and of utmost importance - ride on and ride safe! I WILL see you on the trail, hopefully very soon!
Mary |
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