hongkongexpat’s AchillesBlog

Hello,

I went on a holiday at the beginning over November and went hiking (semi-scrambling) up some hills and it was OK. I last saw my PT mid- November and he was happy with how I was able to handle dynamic movements on the floor and bosu ball. So he said I didn’t need to see him anymore, but can continue to build up the complexity and duration of my exercises on my own. He said I’m able to play 3-on-3 basketball socially, etc and just see how it goes. So I saw the PT a total of 21 times, starting off twice a week, and towards the end it was more like once a month (been busy with work and travel) - I finished PT at the 8.5 month mark. I think if I hadn’t had that set-back in July, and if I had put more work into rehab I could’ve been at the same stage maybe 1.5-2 months earlier. The PT said that stressing the achilles (like stressing your muscles to gain muscle) helps the achilles repair and recover, of course you don’t want to over stress it. In the grand scheme of things, life is a long journey and I’m not bothered by a couple of months delay in returning to sport. I still think back to when I ruptured my achilles, and when I was in the cast and on crutches, and when I was trying to walk normally - I’m still very grateful about the little things like being able to walk around unassisted, carrying a cup of tea on my own, and getting up on my tippytoes to get something from the top shelf!

Just a final thought on recovery - although it’s very useful to compare our rehabilitation against peers for a benchmark, recovery varies so much case by case. It varies by the severity of ATR, op protocol, PT protocol, how much time and effort we are able to put into PT rehab, what our goals are, etc. It’s clear that the timetable for recovery for all of us bloggers will likely vary. But let’s look at an example of professionals. Brandon Jennings, and NBA player, ruptured his achilles in January 2015 and is yet to return to competition (expected to in late December 2015). While Wes Matthews, also an NBA player, ruptured his at the start of March 2015 and returned a few days after the 7.5 month mark, in late October 2015. These guys will have similar resources, schedules, and goals yet I was surprised to see such a difference.

Finally, I’m probably not going to visit this page as often now. I’d just like to thank all of you who have been on this journey together - thanks for the comments and answers to my questions, and thanks for sharing your journeys also. Happy healing!

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