*WK 2-3: What Does Not Kill You Makes You Stronger … (Jun 17th - 30th, 2016))
June 30, 2016 by agnesatr
It’s been 3 weeks since my rupture and 2 weeks since my non-operative treatment began. The last 2 weeks have been pretty much an adjustment period and I have to say I am now getting used to this one legged situation. Everything now seems easier and I do not really have any complaints (well, except that I am short of one leg!).
LEG’S STATE
I don’t have any pain and have not been taking any meds. I do feel swelling after some time of being on crutches, or on my iWalk, or even sitting with my leg down, but elevation of the leg always helps. I basically always have to plan: after some period of activity I needed to elevate for a bit. I am also icing in the evenings. I was not supposed to remove my boot at all except for spot cleaning my foot, so I was icing inside of my boot. I was unstrapping couple of boot straps and placing the ice bag inside of the boot. This way I complied with doctor’s orders and got some swelling down. 
SLEEPING
The sleeping has became easier as well. Try sleeping in a boot that resembles a ski boot with covers on top of it! I remember in week one I did not sleep soundly even one night with the weight of the covers on the boot waking me up constantly. I solved the problem. Since my injured leg is on the right, hubby and I swapped places where we sleep. Now I sleep with the injured leg on the outside of the bed. That way I can cover myself with covers completely except the injured leg. That helped me a lot with sleeping. No more waking up with the boot tangled in the covers!
WORKING OUT
I also have been working out quite a bit. Since week 1 I was exploring all the exercises I know, picking out the ones that do not use both legs and trying to adapt them to non-weight bearing on one leg. It has been so good to move. It gives me more energy and I do not feel as tired from all this hopping around on one leg. It also feels amazing to move my upper body, since there is so much sitting/elevating involved in the first 2 weeks. Another thing I am still a bit worried about is muscles atrophy. My calf muscles in my injured leg will disappear. I cannot help it, but I am trying to work on my injured upper leg muscles. That way when I start walking again I do not have to worry about my upper leg muscles as well as my calf rehab. Below are few examples of my NWB workouts.
GETTING OUT
At the end of week 2 I ventured out a little. A friend of mine had a baby shower and it was with females only and no kids, so I decided to make it my social debut on crutches/iWalk. I am glad I brought both of my “toys” with me as the house the baby shower was held at had a steep staircase. iWalk was amazing help with that! It is so easy to use it on the stairs. Also, going down the stairs, it is so easy to go backwards on iWalk! It was a tip in their manual that I ignored initially, but it came in handy on a narrow stairway. Now I only go backwards when going downstairs. It also is much easier to stand on iWalk in social situations. I could actually hold my plate and stand with free hands. I still had friends helping me with this and that, since I am slower, but I did not feel too handicapped on it! It was definitely good to finally dress in something else than shorts/t-shirt. That’s good for mind’s healing. 
Also, last weekend we did some yard work. Yep, I said we! My hubby picked up my yard mowing, but I managed giving it a go as well. It was actually not bad on the iWalk. Holding the lawn mower for support definitely helped. I also did a little bit of weeding and flower trimming. When walking on iWalk on uneven grass you definitely need to be careful, but I was able to do it slowly.
CRUTCHES
As far as crutches go, I got some crutches covers in week 2. These were very helpful to me. After week one on the original crutch handles I felt bruised on my upper ribs and my thumbs were hurting. Since I used the padding all is good and crutches became my better friends. I would recommend everyone to get some covers in your week one before the pain sets in. I also became more handy at carrying some things with crutches. Nothing though beats iWalk for carrying things around! I love that thing, can’t you tell.
2 WEEK DOCTOR’S CHECKUP
And on a final note, I saw my orthopedic doctor today. 2 week check up (3 weeks since rupture). It went well. My foot is now more comfortably moving up and down in plantar flexion. My boot has been adjusted from 35 degrees to 25 degrees plantar flexion. I was also told to do range of motion (ROM) exercises. My protocol states 5 minutes of exercises outside of the boot every hour, but the doctor stated few times a day is fine. I will have it in my next update how did my schedule look like with the foot ROM exercises. I am really excited to move my foot even a bit. I am still NWB for the next couple of weeks. I can set my foot on the floor in a boot though and put a bit of pressure on it. Not quite PWB yet. I was told ROM is the most important at the moment to help with the healing of the tendon. My next check up is in 2 weeks.
CALF ATROPHY
Below is my calf comparison to show the atrophy that happened just in 3 weeks. My calf shrunk 1 inch! My right calf has always been about 0.5 inch thicker than my left one and now my left calf is 0.5 inch thicker than the right one! That was fast…
RIGHT CALF ATROPHY: 1 INCH SMALLER!!!
So here we go, on to the next part of healing!
Hope everyone’s calves are healing well!!!
HERE IS MY VLOG FROM WEEK 2 AND 3:
Good post. Yeah - calf atrophy sets in very quickly. When I got my splint off after surgery (2 week mark) it had already shrank down considerably. Crazy how fast it does that.
Doing ROM early is definitely encouraged. I moved mine around at basically all times when I wasn’t on my feet in the aircast.
Did your doc give you any bands to exercise with yet? Depending on the protocol he follows, it might not be a bad idea to ask if you can get some and get going on those exercises. Earlier the better. It’s pretty typical to wait until 6 weeks for that, though.
Good luck. The worst part’s over for you for sure.
Yep, my calf look even smaller 2 weeks after last post. I am scared to measure it. haha
I will ask my doc this week about the bands for ROM. I am starting my 6th week today, so your suggestion is right on time. Thanks for that!
Thanks for your blog. You have not posted in a while so I hope this made you stronger.
vplite - I am now 6 months since rupture. I have been posting every couple of week initially and now I post about once a month, since in the later stage there are less drastic changes and mostly lots of PT and work on strength and flexibility. Will be adding something tomorrow. Hope you are healing well.
Hi agnesatr,
Thanks for your detailed posting. I am 2 months post surgery and am still using the iWalk every day. It is so much better than the other options such as crutches or a walker. I don’t think I would be working without the iWalk. Still, I will be so happy to put this crutch away.
My calf has shrunken a lot, but at least I have been using the left side of my body (except the calf).
My surgeon has been very conservative, probably because of my age. I hope to get cleared for PWB and PT at my appointment 12/23.
Glad things are coming along well for you. Thanks for the pics of you exercising.
I miss hiking terribly. I hope I can get back to it as quickly as you did.
vplite - I hear ya about iWalk. Life saver, but, yes putting it away will be a good feeling!
Only 9 days for you for PWB, that’s very exciting. The sooner they clear you to put some pressure on that achilles the better, as that has been shown to help healing the tendon. I know everyone’s protocol is very different and they are tailored to each individual. Is your doc/PT making you do some gentle ROM exercises? That will definitely help with PWB as your ankle will not be as stiff.
I know what you mean about hiking! You will get there! It’s a testing injury, but you will get there! Just do your PT diligently, as that helps speed up the process. Crossing fingers for your speedy recovery!
Hi Agnes
I totally agree about exercising during the healing time of this ATR and was wondering if you could share any other exercises you did that were not included in your video/blog?I am quite fit and I don’t want my whole body to atrophy! I would love any additional suggestions you have (if you can remember from a year ago)! Thanks!
Sharlene - get on Youtube and search for 1-footed exercise videos. I found quite a few and did those. Once I got to the point where I didn’t have to elevate my foot most of the time (I had a bone spur surgery so a bit different from yours) I started going to the gym and did the rower (with only my good foot strapped in) and the recumbent bike (that was HARD with only 1 foot strapped in so I was happy when my doc finally gave me the OK to rest my booted surgery foot on it, just not to push with it). I did various ab exercises, various arm exercises with weights, … I found many videos on youtube and picked various exercises to do from those.
I echo what crespent said about youtube. Also any abs exercises you can think of will work. I was holding weights when doing various abs exercises. You can do lots of plank exercises with your injured leg resting on the good leg. Basically one legged planks variations and getting into elbow planks. I did lots of one legged pushups and graduated to one legged burpees. These were not my favorite, but was the only way I could get my heart rate up quickly. You can mess around with push up on knees and do variations of angles to get back and chest muscles. My doc told me to do lots of leg lifts to prevent atrophy of my upper leg. So I would sit on the bench and do a lot of leg lifts. Lot of single leg squats for the good leg. Calf raises for the good leg. Any upper body weight exercises. Balances on good leg. Band exercises. As I showed, rowing machine and stationary biking were my daily warm ups as well. When you get cleared for swimming, swimming with pull buoy is also very good for upper body and oh so freeing!
I did p90x and insanity before the injury, so I modified bunch of exercises from these programs to do with single leg. Just make sure you tighten your boot well to not move the injured foot at all. Taking care of that foot should be the most important thing. I was told to also not do anything that stretches the injured calf.
I’m not in any discomfort and haven’t been taking any medications. I do get swelling after some time on crutches, my iWalk, or sitting with my leg down, but elevating the leg always helps.
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