kamrynfig’s AchillesBlog

I’ve had my hands full with school the past weeks but now that I’m done I can update again!

A week before surgery, I met with my PA and he gave me forms telling me what not to do before surgery which included taking pain relievers, eating food, drinking water, etc. I also found out that the operation will be percutaneous which I was very happy about. I didn’t find out the time of my surgery until around 2 days before the surgery day. For me, mine was scheduled super early around 6 I believe.

So morning of, the process before surgery took around 30-45 minutes. They put an IV in, checked my blood pressure, etc. Then, the surgeon came and re-reviewed by MRI and marked up my leg of where he was going to cut. He explained to me that it was going to be a small incision where my achilles tore and then he said he was going to anchor it to my heel. That part confused me a bit but I just went with it. They took me back to the operating room and knocked me out.

The operation itself only took about an hour and when I woke up, they fed me some jello and gave me water. After waking up, I was only there for about 30 minutes before they wheeled me out to the car. My lower leg was in a splint that was very, very thick because of all the ace bandages they used. Since I was still in school around the time I got my surgery, I also got a doctor’s note excusing me for 2 weeks because I had to keep my leg elevated at all times.

After reading other people’s comments about how much pain they were in after surgery, I was kind of freaked out and for the first day, I took my pain meds as often as directed. But, now that I think about it, I wasn’t in any pain honestly. The first 2-3 days after surgery, I still wasn’t experiencing that much pain. I was elevating 24/7 (except for when I went to the bathroom, obviously). The only time I was bothered by pain was when I was sleeping. I always woke up at 2 am the first few days after surgery which irritated me. It was very hard to find a comfortable position to sleep in as whatever position I settle in, it always starts to hurt a few hours later. But, after the first 2 days I was completely off my pain meds and I was instead using Advil, which worked just as well in my opinion. I was also taking Bayer to reduce the chance of blood clots.

After a week, it was practically painless. I still elevated most of the time but definitely not as much as I did during the first week. Sleeping got much much better. I found that putting a pillow inbetween my lower legs with my bad leg on top worked wonders. But overall at this point, the huge splint was more of an annoyance than anything else.

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