So they put back into a boot for a month after a partial rerupture after week 8. I hope to be out of it by mid Feb. I still cannot raise my heel off the floor. I hope I didn’t waste a month and have to redo the surgery.How long did you take until you could raise your heel off the floor ? This is the pits !!!!
Went to the Doc yesterday. He said everything looked good. I was walking in two shoes and doing PT. Then I asked about the indent in my heal. He said you pull your tendon partially apart and it is not 100 % together. Go back in the boot for 1 month with no PT and no walking in 2 shoes. I am going to get an MRI to see what damage was done. I guess I was too aggressive with my rehab. I could not get on my toes on the foot that was operated on. I was 3 weeks ahead of schedule now I am 6 weeks behind schedule. I hope I don’t need surgery again. Does anyone know if this will heal back after another month in a boot ? This sucks !!!!
Ok I am on week 8 !!! Out of everything but shoes. Walking a mile a day and took a shower standing on both feet today !!!! PT is real fun !!!! Have a great Holiday and keep plugging along !!!!
Done with cast after 4 weeks now in boot for 2 weeks. Walking with a walker with 50% weight on my injured foot. Then lots of PT. This is not fun but I guess it is life in the fast or now slow lane for awhile.
While playing Pickleball on August 16th in Park City, UT I heard what I thought was a dropped racket or my partner hit me in the leg. Then I took one step and that ended the game and we were ahead !!! I went to Urgent Care and the doc said I pulled a tendon on the side of my foot and I should be ok in 5 to 10 days. Just ice it and treat it like a sprain. He did not take an xray or MRI. I did what he said and did not have much pain. After 2 weeks we returned to our home in Tucson and played golf a couple of times. Then went to Seattle and did a bunch of hiking from 2 to 3 miles a day for 4 days. Then off to Boston then home. I was a bit gimpy but not much pain and could not get up on my left toe. I still had some swelling so I went to a ankle doctor. He did an xray then said I should have an MRI. He suspected an ruptured Achilles. When the MRI came back it verified that I ruptured my Achilles and it had a .75 inch gap and should get it operated on ASAP. I wanted a second and third opinion so I went to another doctor, all foot surgeons, and he said I had a bad front foot and need reconstructive surgery before I had my Achilles fixed. He ordered a CT scan and by the time I had the scan and made another appointment it would of been 3 weeks. I went to another surgeon and he recommended that I go to PT for 5 weeks then come back for further evaluation. Now it is 2 and a half months since the rupture and it is getting to a point of no return. One of my friends suggested the Mayo Clinic in Phoenix so I booked an appointment and headed to Palm Desert for some golf for 4 days. Played golf twice then headed to Mayo. I saw the doctor and in 20 minutes he said you need Achilles surgery ASAP and we can do it Friday. This was Tuesday. He stated it was too late to do the nonsurgical way of fixing it. He said the front of the foot could wait since it has never hurt for 30 years and I could walk fine. So I got operated on Friday Oct 31st 3 days after my appointment. It has been a little over a week and I am doing ok. I have never had surgery or been in a hospital except to be born. Now I have to go up to the Mayo Clinic for 7 weeks to get my cast changed to start elevating my foot back to 90 degrees. It is going to be a long 6 months before I am able to play golf or go hiking or ? The Mayo Clinic is an amazing place ! Everyone there are super !!!! Even the food is good !!! So the morale of my first blog is get a second and maybe a 3rd or 4th opinion. If I waited I probably would of never walked again the right way. Stay tuned for the continuing saga and rehab !!! PS My rupture ended up being 2 inches instead of the .75 because of the length of time I waited.
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Sorry to hear about that. I had a partial re-tear after week 4 and went back to NWB at 30 degrees for 2 weeks than back to PWB and have been at 10 degrees this past week w/ no issues.
I just did some seated heel raises with no issue (pain).
I read a study from 2008 about high dose vitamin c helping with achilles rehab on rats. I’ve been taking 1000mg per day extra for about 3 weeks now and my progress has been quite good. Not sure if that’s helping also just re-read it and its once every 2 days i’ve been doing daily oops lol
I think it’s not unusual to have a remaining dent in the back of the tendon at 12 weeks. How did you feel walking in 2 shoes? Were you progressing toward a proper stride, with a push-off at the end, or did it seem hopeless?
I agree that MRIs seem very subjective…
Sabre you have had a tough time. Is this the same doctor that operated? It seems odd that he thought everything looked good and then switched to a partial re-rupture.
I am also surprised that your PT didn’t pick the dent up and flag it as a concern.
By “up on your toes” if you mean a single leg heel raise that is very normal at your stage, even holding full body weight on the injured foot is tough.
Good luck with the MRI and resting- I hope you are up and walking boot free soon!
Sorry to hear, did you do anything specific where you noticed something happening? Also, I’ve understood that MRIs are notoriously difficult to interpret, even for new full ruptures, so not sure how conclusive that will be on the extent of the damage…
Ugh…I’ve been waffling on non-op vs op for my partial rerupture but I don’t think an MRI is going to be conclusive unless it’s a clean tear/full one (based on my experience and convos with my OS)
My personality is not one that allows for what ifs and uncertainty so the conservative approach would not suit me plus if it doesn’t heel properly I worry about surgery down the road which would be more complex than this one and starting all over again at that point.
Did you feel anything? Pop/tear etc? Pain, swelling?
There are so many variables to this, I know of one person who non-op’d on rupture and rerupture but this appears to not be the norm. Most reruptures on here went with surgery the 2nd time, relatively quickly.
For me the choice is take the more immediate risks of surgery, but have a definitive answer. An MRI of a re-tear might not show the full extent, certainly not at my stage maybe at yours though.
I would get the MRI done asap and see what they say.
This friday will be 7 weeks post op and it has been a gruesome process. I rather go back to iraq for another deployment than deal with this. With that said I will get tjrough this and so will everybody else. I feel like my doc is on the conservative side. I will be starting pt next week, although I have been stretching and massaging my tendom to try break some scar tissue down. The surgery area is still hard and im seeing that this is normal.
well this site has helped me and would like to follow people that are couple weeks ahead of me so I know what to except.
Donna, when we’re able to shower standing up, it’s a tiny thing. When we’re not, it’s enormous! One good mental trick is to focus on what we’ve got, and not just on what we don’t have. It takes effort, but it’s worth it.
I was in multiple casts for 4 weeks. Then boot for 2 weeks. Now shoes with lifts. Small things add up !!!
Sounds great to me! I’m also glad they got you a boot instead of multiple casts, and got you out of it promptly too.
YAY! I am going to try showering standing up over the next few days…it’s funny how this simple thing has become a new goal!
Happy Holidays!
Congrats! Sounds great! Enjoy the holidays and watch out for the special egg nog that might make you lose balance 
I’d say AchillesBlog.com/Cecilia/protocols shows the Moderately Fast Lane. More importantly, the lane that gets to the best place. Your lane is close - slower at 2-5 weeks, faster at 7… I see no benefit in straying from the lanes that get to the best place - unless it’s in a large randomized controlled trial (RCT) that might prove that there’s a better lane.
Good news ! I am going to be out of a cast in a total of 4 weeks, then a boot for a week then shoes. Then the fun begins !!!!
As long as everybody understands that Listen To Your Body does NOT mean that you can’t get into trouble if you’re not doing something painful, because you definitely can.
I understand Norm, but listinening to our body includes our brain after all, just sayin…
I can’t believe you lasted 2.5 months with a rupture, what a trooper. Glad to hear you found your way to the Mayo Clinic and are on the recovery road (with an iphone holder!). I am an Aussie living in Canada so understand Stuart drawing a blank on pickleball- I thought it was a form of local slang at first!
Retired, lots of us — including me! — have gotten into trouble by straying from the best protocols WHILE listening to our bodies. In my case, I reluctantly followed the instructions of an ignorant PT who told me to do 1-legged heel raises long before they were appropriate, or prescribed in any of the successful protocols listed in AchillesBlog.com/Cecilia/protocols. I was pretty sure it was too soon, but only because I knew that I couldn’t do 8 “reps”, and that’s always been my definition of an exercise that’s too hard. BUT there was no pain at the time, so “listening to my body” wouldn’t have saved me.
In fact, the pain didn’t start until hours later, and the pain persisted for a MONTH. Much more painful than the original ATR, and maybe roughly as painful as the pain immediately post-op — and scarier, because I knew what was causing THAT pain.
So I’d say if you have a choice between following a schedule that has been proven to produce good results in a large group, OR exploring your own path while listening to your body, you’ll be much safer following the proven protocol.
Mind you, if something hurts, don’t rush to do it eith
Hi Sabre38, I think the reruptures with the aggressive approach are probably a result of them not listening to their body. You can push yourself until your body tells you enough… if you don’t pay attention to that it can spell trouble. I think aggressive is the way to go for expedient, solid recovery as long as you listen to what you body tells you.
A few scooter folks here have run over their “good” foot. Usually no lasting damage, but not a Good Thing.
Sabre38, lots of Docs are still confused about the evidence, and believe that speed is scary in ATR rehab, because it’s true on the road in the car. Seems logical, so it’s easy to believe. The studies are there for you to read, linked from Cecilia’s page and the Protocols and studies page and my two studies pages too. Docs are humans, and busy ones, and most of them can still learn. If you can educate yours with facts and evidence, you’ll be saving yourself AND the next maybe 100 ATR patients from a brutal useless nuisance…
And Wallace (see AchillesBlog.com/Cecilia/protocols) shocked us all by treating most of his neglected ATR patients successfully non-op. Most of us (including me, the non-op booster) thought that was impossible. But evidence beats “it seems logical”.
Be careful on the scooter. go slow I just fell off of mineand put my foot down as a matter reaction and boy did it hurt now I’m worried of me and we ruptured I’m just glad I had my boot on.
Thanks for your comments. I am on a roller scooter and now can get around much better. I asked my Doc about the fast track and he stated that we take the conservative approach vs the liberal approach since the rerupture rate is higher with the liberal approach. I am 69 years old and do not want to do this again. I thought they played volley ball at nudist resorts. Now pickleball ! Right on ! You should see the Iphone holder that the caster built in to my cast. It must be the most expensive Iphone case ever !!!! I had to have surgery since I waited so long to find out what the problem was.
I am also amazed at the variation of OS diagnosis. I am 66 and a fellow pickleball victim. I had surgery 3 days after the injury but my OS casted me at 90 degrees from the get go so I was in 2 shoes at 6.5 weeks. That is a funny comment that Stuart made about pickleball at a nudist camp. It is a huge sport in Florida and spreading across the nation.
What Stuart said! Those modern protocols — including 3 you can find at achillesblog.com/cecilia/protocols — generally get you FULL weight bearing at around 4 weeks, and PARTIALLY WB as early as 2 weeks in. And most of them use boots from the very start non-op, or after 2 weeks in a splint after surgery (to sop up the ooze).
There are some patients in Belfast being successfully treated non-op with “chronic” (long ignored or misdiagnosed) ATRs, as you can see from the Wallace study (on Cecilia’s page). Wallace only sent a few for surgery, the ones whose torn AT ends wouldn’t meet (”approximate”) when he plantaflexed their foot. Until that study, most of us were convinced that chronic ATs needed surgery, period. Wallace also got excellent results with ALL his (few) REruptures, non-op. Overall, he got <3% rerupture rate, which is pretty good with or without surgery.
His “secret” was to approximate the torn ends with plantarflexion, then to immobilize each ankle at exactly the angle that did the job. If the ends wouldn’t meet at any angle — true only for a few of his chronic ATRs, and none of the promptly treated ones or the re
I can’t believe a doctor knowing you have ruptured your achilles has told you to just go to PT for 5 weeks. What you will find here is so much variation in the manner of treatment that it can become confusing. Look at what you have experienced already. That is confusing enough. In the end you will be playing golf again and pickleball. You are the second person I have heard rupture during pickleball. The other is retired65. I have never heard of it before then so I had to google it. The first image that came up on google was people playing it at a nudist resort. It is not a big sport down our way. Anyway, the Mayo certainly has a good reptutation world wide for being up to date but I am surprised they still multiple casting for this injury. The most modern protocols get people into walking boots early and have them weight bearing around 4 weeks. The method they are using still works but it is more of a pain for the patient. There is a recent post from ctcbusted about this that is worth reading. You seem very relaxed about this which is a great thing and will certainly help you through the recovery. Hope it goes well.
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