metonia’s AchillesBlog

I know hydration is important. I know being dehydrated can severely effect how the body functions and cause systems to shut down.

I have arthritis almost everywhere but my lower back is the worst. If I even get slightly dehydrated, the thin layer between my spine, nerves and spinal column become effected and I get spasms across the tops of my feet from rubbing against the nerve/spine.

My question is how does dehydration affect recovery and/or pain from our surgery? I’m wondering if being dehydrated can amplify the pain and burning feelings in my foot, especially the spur removal and anchor site.

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Days 3-5 were consistent. I can empathize with all the other posters when they describe their foot/heel as feeling squishy. For me it felt more like when you have a soft sock that falls down and settles under your heel; very annoying.  Numbness seems to be a big issue. It doesn’t feel so much like pain as that tingling burning pins and needles feeling. Or that just waking up feeling you get after something “falls” asleep and becomes numb and tight feeling.

Day 5 I finally was able to make if farther than the bedside commode as hubs finally found me a used wheelchair. Desperate to make it to the bathroom to use a real toilet I ended up stuck and had to be helped up. Utilizing the frame of the bedside commode alleviated that issue since it was higher and had the handlebars I could use to raise myself up on one foot.

Day 6 was doctor day. My surgeon was away so I saw her associate. He showed me my before and after x-rays and where the hunk of bone was removed.

I was a bit surprised my incision wasn’t directly at the back of my ankle. It was off a bit to the side. That area still had quite a bit of swelling and bruising but only on that side. I still had to much for the boot so I was re-wrapped using the splint cast. It was wrapped a bit differently. By the time I arrived home I could not believe the amount of pain I was having.  Nothing I did relieved it and the pain medication wasn’t touching it. I finally made my husband take the elastic wrap off and re-wrap it. He ended up doing this 4 times before I obtained relief.

The problem seemed to be how it was wrapped.  They used an ace elastic wrap around the foot and ankle then another one around the splint. It put to much pressure on my tendon incursion bone repair site is what I believe to have happened. I had hubs re-wrap the ankle in cotton to shield it than wrap the splint with the elastic wrap. The unbearable pain went away.

I thought about calling my doctor to make them aware because I don’t know if there was a specific purpose for how they wrapped it. I know it would help reduce the swelling but in my mind elevation and ice do the same thing.

Day 7 I was in the wheel chair most of the day. I tried to keep it elevated as much as possible. I did notice more tingling and numbness the longer it was down.

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Day 1 was not as easy as I had hoped it to be.  I didn’t sleep well even with the nerve block. It finally wore off completely around 4:30 AM.  Nothing seemed to help much throughout the day.

I read my post-op instructions that were given to my husband to sign.  He wasn’t told much, just the “sign here here and here” part.  I had 14 of the 17 printed pages of instructions send home. They kept the one’s he signed.

First surprise… bed-rest for the first 5 days until I see the doctor on Tuesday.

I discovered the 2 pillows I was to use under my foot/leg actually made the pain worse.  I was placed in a plaster split with gauze and ace wrap. The doctor had told my husband my surgery went very well, way better than expected to the point I should be ahead in my recovery by around 2 weeks. (what ever that is suppose to mean, hopefully I will find out at my appointment.)

The splint is about 5 inches wide, the tips of my first 3 toes stick out over the gauze covered edge. It then goes down/?up the sole of my foot then forms around my heel and up my calf to about 3-4 inched below the back of my knee.

The leg is completely gauze wrapped and then loosely ace bandage wrapped. After the nerve block wore off I discovered I could move my toes easily. I also discovered that wasn’t the thing I was suppose to do…. boy did it cause me pain.

Since the past few months of physical therapy involved moving my ankle and toes often,even before I crawled out of bed in the morning it became a habit I actually did even in my sleep. (even toe movement pulls on the back of the calf because of how all the lower leg muscles intertwine.

Next issue I discovered was that I could rest my leg on its side for some relief except the same thing happened… Pain because the splint is so small it only extends up the back of my leg.

The pillow’s as in plural also ended up putting pressure on the back of my calf up at my knee, which again… pain because the calf muscle was being manipulated. (almost like the test for a complete Achilles rupture).  It would feel much better flat against the bed.  Because I knew the importance of it being elevated, I fortunately have an old Craftmatic bed that allows the foot of the bed to raise. Trouble with that was if I had the head of the bed elevated at the same time to watch tv, for unknown reasons it also caused pain.  Once I lowered the head of the bed the pain went away.

No matter what I did all day long, including using my prescribed pain meds and ice nothing helped or worked.  To top matters off, my daughter stopped by to help make supper for us and my 2 and 3 year old grandchildren had a field day bouncing on my bed and trying to crawl all over me or “kiss” my boo-boo. If I snarled at them their beautiful tiny faces would drop like I stole their lollipops. I actually just plain fell asleep from exhaustion. After supper the 3 year old came in to discover I was awake and announced it to everyone, then very unhappily with his little frownie face asked “why did I pass out” lol I didn’t even know he had that kind of vocabulary.

The pain is hard to describe because it varied throughout the day from dull aches to bad aches, burning, pins and needles, some times all of them at the same time. Some of the pains would extend into my toes sometimes it was localized at the back of my heel. Sometimes it was sharp like being stuck by a needle on the sides of my ankles.

If I layed on my side with a body pillow to support my entire leg, foot and ankle I could find some comfort and sleep for awhile.

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I’m struggling with the decision of going forward with my planned surgery. I have a spur at the achilles tendon insertion site. I waited months before I went to see my doctor after the pain just wouldn’t go away. Then I had months of physical and aqua therapy along with massage, ultrasound and I

The pain started out gradual, I think from attempting to create a vegatable garden on a hill side. The attempt to stand and the bending while trying to maintain ones balance on a hill caused quite a bit of irritaion and swelling.

Add to that numerous times tripping and stubbling sideway and you have a tendonitis and a bursitis on top of the ever enlargening spur.

On the whole my heel feels pretty good in the mornings if I were my stationary boot the specialist gave me. But it’s uncomfortable to wear and my heel still rubs against the mattress at night which can cause discomfort.

If I rest alot and don’t do much walking I’m fine, but the longer the day goes on and the more I’m on my feet the worse I feel by the end of the day.

I’m not an extremely active person but that’s because I also have knee issues (degerative joints) as well as osteoathritis in my hips and other joints. I have a frozen tendon in my left shoulder from an old auto accident and back problems.

I’m in a maintainence program at therapy which includes regular aqua therapy as often as I want in the pool. It’s not a big pool, basically only arms length wide with two foot drop off increments to six feet. It’s a one person pool so sessions have to be scheduled which so far hasn’t been an problem since I can nolonger work.

So I keep wondering… “should I have surgery or shouldn’t I”? I think if it was just myself, no family or friends I’d opt out.

But I have grandchildren that I love and want to spend time with. They’re young and very active lol. I want to be able to go places with them and not have to worry “am I going to be able to walk the distance”…

I know many of the posters here have had differant injuries and durgery and recovery is different for everyone. I know I’m in denial much of the time, especially on the good days thinking “I don’t need it”. Then I have a bad day and just want rid of the pain. I’m just not sure what I want to do.

I’m worried about my recovery also and how my body is going to respond. I’m on prednisone and I know that delays healing. I’m worried about crutches. I’m still overweight (although on the plus side I’ve lost 120 pounds of my 200 loss goal) and also have carpel tunnel in my wrist. Combine that with the PMR (polymialgia rheumatica an auto immune disease where the body produces antibodies that attack healthy tissue) which affects mainly the shoulder and hip joints and I know crutches will literally be an unbearable pain.

Oh if I could only make up my mind…..

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