I've Fallen and I Can't Get Up...Or Something Like That
So I've known this information for almost a week now. And I've held it close, only talking about it with a couple people. I guess I'm just embarrassed. I'm tired of needing help. I'm tired of talking about medical problems. We've had a lot with my mono/Lyme disease last year and Caleb's 2 surgeries. I kind of just want to pretend it's not real. But it is, and so here it is.
About 2 months ago, on a rainy day, I was getting the kids our of the car and slipped on the wet garage floor and totally wiped out. I had immediate intense pain and wasn't sure I was going to be able to stand up. Bethy was so sweet and came over and started picking up the things I dropped and asking how she could help. Fortunately I did get up and even managed to hobble around and make the kids' lunch. I limped around for the next few days, went to the dr. twice, got a brace, some pain meds, and anti inflammatory meds and assumed I'd heal with time. It did get better. I stopped limping and was generally pain free. But every few days, I would twist it wrong, or try and kneel down, or squat to get the laundry out and the horrible pain would come back. Over time I've gone back to being in some level of pain all the time. I'm still taking pain meds almost every day. This week I'm finding it hard to walk for more than a 15 minutes or so. I probably made it worse because I waited so long to go back to the doctor.
So, last week I had Xrays and an MRI and learned I completely tore my PCL (posterior cruciate ligament) and partially tore my ACL (anterior cruciate ligament). Here's what a healthy knee looks like.
http://orthoinfo.aaos.org/topic.cfm?topic=a00420
The two ligaments together control the back and forth movement of your knee. A PCL tear is pretty rare and ACL is more common. Having both tear leaves the knee very unstable.
From what we read online and what my primary care doctor says, surgery is inevitable followed by a ton of physical therapy. I will be meeting with a surgeon Friday to see what he thinks.
PCL surgery is more complicated than ACL and my healing time will be long. Looks like I won't be able to drive for a couple months (it's my right knee) and will have to be off of it for several weeks. And then I will also be looking at 6 or more months of therapy. I'll know more after Friday.
I'll keep you posted, but for now, we'd appreciate your prayers. This is not fun to deal with but we are blessed in so many ways and this will not get us down.
About 2 months ago, on a rainy day, I was getting the kids our of the car and slipped on the wet garage floor and totally wiped out. I had immediate intense pain and wasn't sure I was going to be able to stand up. Bethy was so sweet and came over and started picking up the things I dropped and asking how she could help. Fortunately I did get up and even managed to hobble around and make the kids' lunch. I limped around for the next few days, went to the dr. twice, got a brace, some pain meds, and anti inflammatory meds and assumed I'd heal with time. It did get better. I stopped limping and was generally pain free. But every few days, I would twist it wrong, or try and kneel down, or squat to get the laundry out and the horrible pain would come back. Over time I've gone back to being in some level of pain all the time. I'm still taking pain meds almost every day. This week I'm finding it hard to walk for more than a 15 minutes or so. I probably made it worse because I waited so long to go back to the doctor.
So, last week I had Xrays and an MRI and learned I completely tore my PCL (posterior cruciate ligament) and partially tore my ACL (anterior cruciate ligament). Here's what a healthy knee looks like.
http://orthoinfo.aaos.org/topic.cfm?topic=a00420
The two ligaments together control the back and forth movement of your knee. A PCL tear is pretty rare and ACL is more common. Having both tear leaves the knee very unstable.
From what we read online and what my primary care doctor says, surgery is inevitable followed by a ton of physical therapy. I will be meeting with a surgeon Friday to see what he thinks.
PCL surgery is more complicated than ACL and my healing time will be long. Looks like I won't be able to drive for a couple months (it's my right knee) and will have to be off of it for several weeks. And then I will also be looking at 6 or more months of therapy. I'll know more after Friday.
I'll keep you posted, but for now, we'd appreciate your prayers. This is not fun to deal with but we are blessed in so many ways and this will not get us down.
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Comments
Take all the help that is offered, you'll need it. If you don't have them in your bathroom, you might want to consider a chair height toilet, definitely a shower chair, and walker. Borrow an icing machine for post-op use. (it circulates ice cold water through a pad which is highly effective--much better than an ice pack).