1st day after surgery

The surgeon said the surgery went fine.  It was pushed back to 4:00pm, which made for a very hungry boy.  The surgeon said it was frayed like a rope, but he feels good about the repair.  I was completely doped up after surgery, I kept falling asleep while I was supposed to be getting ready to leave.  Felt really good last night, but today has not been very good.  I went 12 hours without pain pills which I paid dearly for.  Hard to describe the pain, but it isn’t really sharp.  It is just constant aching with periods of higher intensity.  Did anyone get a feeling of “leg clausterphobia mixed with restless leg syndrome?”  I almost drove myself to a panic attack thinking about it.  How was everyone else’s pain the first day after?  All the advice is definitely true, elevate every minute you can.  Just the few periods I had it down caused throbbing.  I wish there were some way to ice it.  Also, what type of pain medication did everyone get?  I was prescribed Vicodin and ibuprofen.  I thought that Percocet or stronger would be better suited for surgical pain.  I did get a wheelchair (thanks for the advice) which will be my saving grace through this ordeal. 

Thanks again for all the comments and advice. 

5 Responses to “1st day after surgery”

  1. Congrats on coming home. They sure push you out of the hospital quickly! If you’re in pain, take something, I was warned it doesn’t help the healing process to suffer through pain. Ideally if you don’t need the stronger Vicodin then stick with Ibuprofen. The Ibuprofen being a NSAID helps reduce the inflammation and associated swelling. I had almost no pain after the 2nd day but the constant aching lasted for a few more days. I took an Ibuprofen every day for a week, especially at night to help with the inflammation.

  2. The ED gave me vicodin and I never took it during that first week pre-surgery. The Surgicenter gave me Percoset — I did need a few of those in the first couple of days, but pain subsided by day 3 or 4 as I recall.

    I did feel the claustrophobia that you mention. Others have commented as well - so a normal reaction! Elevation, deep breathing helped. I was in a splint post op for 3 weeks, then a cast for about 3-4 weeks. I did use a big ice pack that I strapped around the splint or cast. It made the leg cooler and gave me mental relief when I was feeling that clautrophobia.

    I think you will get used to it, so hang in there. Good luck with pain, the first couple days are the worst, so it should only get better.

  3. take a couple of pain pills before you go to bed. I woke up several times at 3am in severe pain!!!

  4. Be very careful with perscription pain pills! I had a horrible experience — took Darvocet for one month and then doc told me to stop “cold turkey” and had the most horrific withdrawls and had to be hospitalized on top of the ATR situation….was no fun…so I learned the hard way that after 2 weeks, you are addicted ….learn something new everyday :(
    Just a word of warning….

  5. For me, I was off the serious pain meds after the 3rd day and was just taking Ibuprofen to take the edge off and keep the swelling down.

    I did get the claustrophobia/restless leg feelings once in a while. This typically happened when my toes were feeling cramped or hadn’t been moved in a while. I would understand what “triggers” that feeling since it seems different from person to person.

    I agree with Marianne about the pain pills. I was only on them for three days and had mild withdrawal symptoms as I eased off of them.

    - mike

Leave a Reply

*
To prove you're a person (not a spam script), type the security word shown in the picture.
Anti-Spam Image

Powered by WP Hashcash