The recovery has been fast, but not fast enough for me. I was in an immobilized for 8 days. The day after my surgery, I started physical therapy. The physical therapist took away my leg brace, my ace bandage, and sent me walking! The physical therapy has been really tough. I'm only up to about 92 degrees at range of motion at this time. I'm working really hard and exercising my knee every day. A wonderful friend of mine lent me a Polar Care unit that I've been using to keep the swelling down. I get terrible swelling every day.
I haven't quite kicked the pain pills yet, and that's really hard for me. I've never needed to take pain pills for this long, even when I had wisdom teeth removed from my jaw bone! The pills make me sweat and break out. I also start severely itching after about 30 minutes and this will last up to 3-5 hours. I can't wait until I don't need one every day.
Despite all of this, I will be trying to hike this weekend and will be doing a couple days of camping up in the Smokies! I can't wait to get back outside and feel the trail beneath my feet. I'm sure I'll be slow, so we'll just be doing the nature trails on our park map this time. I'd like to build back up.
After all of this, our AT hike for April is called off. I just won't be physically strong enough to carry a 35-pound pack for two weeks. The AT will always be there... we're going to try again in late August or early September. I can't wait.
Here's a photo the day before my surgery, the last snow of this year, at the Chimney Trailhead. I had the hiking bug, so we had to get out into the Smokies and enjoy it!
