Heal Heel: cpo’s Achilles Blog

Thought it might be useful to some of the new folks (sorry you are in the club) to share out what things look like for me closing in on ten months. I am a 52 year old male, very athletic (hockey, kayaking, hiking, etc), nearly 10 months post-op for a full ATR rupture (surgery March 17, 2015). I was NWB for 30 days, FWB at day 35, in a cast for six weeks and a boot for another six. I was released from PT after seven months.

That all seems like a long time ago now, although I sympathize with those of you that are early stages. Each day got better for me, exponentially so early on, but more gradually later. A brief journal really helped me gauge progress and celebrate small victories, just a sentence or two each day or maybe once a week.

Now I am back running short distances (~2 miles), hiking 5-8 miles on relatively easy (and sometimes hard) terrain, easy kayaking, and am going backpacking next week (probably just a short trip, 4 miles or so each way).  ROM is excellent, though my calf still gets tired and I have trouble pushing off when tired. I’m also still sometimes going sideways downstairs (although I’m often barefoot, which might be part of the reason for that).

I started doing single leg calf raises around 7 months or so, but not very many. I’ve focused on dual leg raises, doing at least 100 a day, and that has helped with strength in my calf. My OS told me that the ability to do solid single level calf raises was the gating factor to hiking and fuller activity, so I focused on that a lot.

Looking back, the knee bike was a critical part of my game, as was a shower chair, a shower bag, and a lot of patience. I was told early on that there are no shortcuts, and I suspect that is true. The good news is that all of the protocols pretty much converge at a year. I took the long view and I’m glad I did, as re-rupture was something I desperately wanted (and want) to avoid.

This is an awesome community. I wish I wasn’t a part of it, but I’m glad all of you are out there lending support. I wish all of you good luck in your recoveries!