The monotony of recovery

Tomorrow will mark two weeks since I made the huge mistake had partial knee replacement surgery. If I had any idea what I was in for, I would've taken my pretty little pedicured feet out that hospital door and headed home. My PT says that there are stages of recovery similar to stages of grief. I'm still in the "why did I do this?" stage and will soon enter the "will it ever get better?" stage.

I saw Dr. Brotzman, my orthopedic surgeon, today for my post-op followup appointment. Overall he is pleased with my progress. I'm up to 90-degrees of flexion in sitting position and up to 95-degrees on the CPM machine. Curtis took this photo with his Blackberry while I was still in the hospital. The CPM bends my knee up and down; I input the degree of flexion. My goal is 120-degrees by next week. We call it The Rack or the torture device depending on how much I'm hurting. Last night while attempting 95-degrees, I could feel my incision tear open a little.

That blue thing on top of my knee with the hose is the ice pack. It's attached to a cooler of ice and pumps cold water around my knee to help with swelling. I'm still on the CPM 6 hours a day at this point... it is so tedious. I do a chunk from 9-11, 1-3, and 7-9 but it feels like I'm on it all day. Anytime I'm in bed, I also have the ice pack on. Anytime I'm not in bed, I have the leg brace on. I'm not needing the walker as much this week as last, but I'm not confident without it yet either. I thought I had a lot of swelling still and it was preventing me from bending too much more and Brotzman agreed. So while I was there, he drained the knee in two places after taking out my stitches.

Can I just say that this was icky and leave it at that?

He said my mobility should improve with some of the fluid drained out. The swelling actually shuts down the quad muscle from contracting so I'm hoping to get more strength there soon. The PT puts an electrical impulse device on my quad during therapy; it's pathetic how little strength is there now. My good leg is in the 300s, my left ranges between 20-40. Wow, right? I'll try not to complain anymore, I promise. Doing all of my PT exercises at home and getting in the hours on the CPM feels like a full-time job. Sleep is elusive as is comfort. At least I'll be allowed to shower now that the stitches are out!

I want to take a moment to express my gratitude for my husband, my daughter, and my mom. Curtis is working 12-16 hour days this week, making dinner for the family, taking the kids out on errands, and doing their bath and bedtime routines. He is exhausted. Oh and he is also filling up my polar ice machine 4 times a day which requires running out to the corner store for ice every other day. He has not complained one time. Jenny is doing our grocery shopping, household chores, errands, and taking care of Dominic. She's also brought me treats and magazines and been super duper sweet. She starts back to school tomorrow for a crazy-intense schedule this spring of classes at two campuses and working too. My mom has been my nurse, my angel, and the one who takes care of everything else. She is helping the kids with their homework, taking me to PT (she is a great chauffeur!), freshening up my bedding, managing my medications, keeping the kids overnight or for a meal to give Curtis a break, and doing some of our household chores... all the while working full-time too. I feel so grateful and guilty too, everyone is so tired. It looks like it will be another few weeks of me being pretty dependent though I am making progress every day. I also want to thank Debbie, Serena, and Renee for dropping by for a visit and bringing treats. Your presence brightened my day so much!

Happy New Year! and Reflections

Every year on New Year's Day, I get into a cleaning frenzy. It's like I *must* start the new year with a clean slate. I also do this mentally too... taking stock of the previous year and setting some goals for the upcoming year. I really don't do resolutions anymore; there are enough pressures I put on myself where I fail that I don't want to add even more. ;)

I did a big recap on the year yesterday when finishing up my 365 Project, so I won't rehash in detail what the year brought us. I also went through the entire year and picked out my favorite ten photos. I captured so many memories! If you want to take a peek at our Christmas season, I created a Flickr set: Christmas 2010.

I feel very blessed to continue to discover new passions. I'm 41 years old and for the last nine years have defined myself as a mom to a child with special needs. In 2010, I found an artist residing in myself... a girl I didn't know existed. Being a science and math geek my whole life, this has been a startling and rewarding discovery. Creating custom cards for clients, scrapping memories with digital scrapbooking, creating for the best designers in the business, and now exploring photography has brought a sense of peace and balance into my life. When so many of my years have been consumed with doctors, appointments, therapists, specialists, tests, ARD meetings, and worrying about my daughter's future, it's easy to lose sight of my individual self. I'm excited to see what 2011 will bring and I hope to share this journey with my friends and family. Thank you for being such a huge support as I went through the ups and downs of this stressful life and for being a spot of sunshine in my life.

Happy New Year!!!

Thoughtful Thursday: Where are my rosy glasses?

I was typing up a getting-to-know-you questionnaire for CrumbSnatchers since we have some new designers and one of the questions was "Are you a half-full or half-empty kind of person?" You know, I used to be a half-full person. I took pride in being happy and optimistic and tackling adversity head on. I did wear rosy glasses and I liked them! In fact, I rocked them! Do you know how I answered that question today?

"It used to be half full but then life drank it and now it's half empty."

How sad is that!?!

What happened to me? There are days when I just plumb don't like myself. Like today, sigh.

I couldn't sleep last night. I tried. My mind was awake and going into those twisty, dark places. Tick Tick Tick Tick. Toss, turn, my mind would just.not.stop.

When I woke up this morning, I felt like I'd been hit by a truck. A 8+ pain day on the Holly Fibro Scale. Which subsequently led me to be a grumpy, ugly person all day. Honestly, I hate to wallow in self-pity, I HATE it but some days, I just want to scream. Enough! These kids are so hard, my marriage is so hard, my pain and my own health issues are so hard. I'm tired, I just want to lay my head down and sob for a while.

But I can't. And I won't. And it wouldn't be in character either. I don't cry. I really don't. I'm strong.

I know once I get some sleep I'll be much better. It's amazing how much this makes such a difference. Anna needs me to be a half-full kind of mommy. Well, really, my whole family does. So I drag myself through this one bad day knowing tomorrow will be better.

It will, right?