Eight Weeks

It's eight weeks to the day since my surgery. That seems like a good reporting point that might interest people.

This past weekend I put in two rides of 17 miles each, and managed the second one in about 15 mph. That's getting better, and now it's just a matter of restoring fitness, losing some pounds, and just plain riding the bike. I experienced no soreness in or around the repaired hip. I did feel more twinges in the other hip than I would have wished for: it looks like some planned obsolescence is striking, and the odds seem good that I'll be treating the other hip sometime before too long.

I'm still slightly tentative with my left leg (avoiding even little hops, and guarding it from large twists) but that may be in my mind as much as a physical limitation. I am walking as normally as I ever have, and any limping is due to my untreated right hip. The muscle trauma in my quadriceps continues to fade but is still detectable, just a bit. Mostly I can pass my Underwear Test: standing on each leg and pulling on pants is now fairly easy, although I have to concentrate some when balancing on my left leg. For clothing as grabby and stretchy as cycling shorts, I'm still being a little careful.

All in all, I'm feeling remarkably well and recovered, not just from the surgery, but from the hip trouble itself. I'm still skeptical about some of those reports about walking easily and unaided only two weeks post-op, but at eight weeks, I'm feeling energetic, strong, and confident.

Eight weeks is also a good time to throttle down this blog. I'll continue to report monthly, or if something special comes up. But for now, I'm going to focus on NOT thinking about the middle-aged hip!

Day 51: Back on the Bike

It's been unseasonably warm and pleasant here in eastern PA and I've been watching the weather with a growing itch to get on the bike. I figured I'd wait until I was fully eight weeks past surgery, which would occur after this coming weekend. But today, I just couldn't take it anymore: I couldn't get a slot for physical therapy, so I headed home to exercise and ride the trainer in the basement, and then I just decided to go for it and take a road ride.

First of course, I had to find all my riding stuff (gloves? what gloves?), replace a battery in the cyclocomputer, etc etc -- I'm always clumsy and inefficient at the start of the riding year, and this is what this ride was like. Plus, as I mentioned in another post, I've been less attentive to natural things like the weather and sunset, so I got off to kind of a late evening start...

I managed a very comfortable 15 miles in 65 minutes. I know that's  s  l  o  w,  but I didn't want to push things, and it's been 14 weeks of little exercise since that last crappy, sore-hip, rain-drenched ride that marked the end of my riding. Plus, I'm 8-10 pounds over normal summer weight and frankly I'm out of aerobic shape.

But at last! Back on the bike! It felt great: no pain (on my left side), no problems with balance or stiffness. I still have a little bit of a knot in my left quadriceps, but wow, it's just feels amazing to feel so much better, so soon.

The Hip Gets the All-Clear

Yesterday on the 11th of September, five weeks and a day after surgery, my surgeon give my hip the all-clear: I can jog, hop, and ride without restrictions. That's great news, although I think I'll hold off on the hopping. My doctor did prescribe more therapy, as I'm still a little stiff and especially if I've been sitting for a while, I walk with a rocking gait at first (technical name: trendelenburg gait). He thinks this is due to some residual weakness in the hip region, possibly because my abductors were weak even before surgery tweaked the region.

I'll be taking aspirin only through the coming weekend, then I'm done with that.

With the no-restrictions news in mind, I pushed a little harder on the trainer yesterday: I comfortably did 10 miles at 16 mph, pushing a harder gear. Not exactly fast, but progress.

Before and After

I'm trundling along, using a cane for longer distances and otherwise nuttin'. I still feel some tweaks high around the hip that keep me from walking normally at times, especially after sitting still for a while (I feel best right after the stretching in therapy, despite the exercise). I'm not quite ready to stand on my left leg and risk the mortification of tumbling to the floor in a tangled pile of legs and half-engaged u-trou.

BUT... the purpose of this post is to show you the before and after X-rays. That's what you've been looking for, right? One image was taken a month before surgery, and the other 10 days after.

Day 28 - Four Weeks In

I was feeling like I was perched on a plateau, but I have been gaining some flexibility and strength. On Friday (two days ago), the elevator at work was gummed up somewhere, so I hiked up to my 4th floor office using the stairs, walking fairly normally. Yesterday we did a half-mile walk around the neighborhood, and I managed it without crutches, walking in style (in my opinion) and "a lot better" (in my wife's opinion). Anyway, for sure I wasn't waddling. I also got in 25 minutes on the trainer and today made it 30 minutes at over 15 mph. Aside from lacking some strength overall and definitely in my left leg and hip area, the main thing I notice now is some ligering tightness, and stiffening up if I sit still for a long time.

It's only been a month since surgery, so I'm feeling pretty good and optimistic at this point. Given statistics about femoral-neck fractures tending to happen in the first two months, I'm glad I'm halfway to that vague milestone. I also feel like I need to reign myself in and not overdo it until I'm further along.

Day 23 - Plateau and the Song of the Open Road

Just a little more than three weeks after surgery, I'm now able to walk for fair bit without any support from a crutch. But after PT or a more active day scuttling around, I get tired and a little sore, which reverts me to a rolling, limping gait. Also, now that I'm more active and not on any anti-inflammatories, my right hip is making itself known (the silver lining of which is that I can compare and see how much better the new hip feels). Overall I feel like I'm on a small plateau, doing ok but still with considerable rehab to do.

The other thing is that it's just gorgeous riding weather, and I miss the bike. I realize that one great thing about the bike is that it makes you more aware of details like the weather: the temperature, wind, and rain all matter a lot, but not if you just blob around in your car. So I'm eager to get back, because I've just been blobbing around in my car for too long.

Oh, Right, About the Pain

Sorry to get so caught up in all the details of surgery that I omitted one important report: what about the pain that I was trying to defeat in the first place?

Well, it's gone! I guess because there is still some stiffness and soreness in my left leg, I haven't been paying attention to this important point. In fact, I've already forgotten what the arthritic pain was like. The only small reminder are some complaints from my right hip, which will probably need work one day before too long.

Thinking about it, it really is astounding. 20 days ago I was limping and wincing, and as most hip sufferers will know, the referred pain - up and down the leg, in my knee, in my groin - was frustrating, widespread, and random. I was getting concerned that my limp was aggravating my knee, such that after surgery, I would have a great hip but a rotten knee and thus no net progress. Not so. All those pains have vanished.