4 months - walking, biking, swimming… doing well!
December 21, 2008 by shelley
I haven’t been on the site much lately. As life begins to seem more and more “normal”, I don’t check the site as much. But, I wanted to post about my progress at 4 months.
Activity:
I walk every morning about 40 minutes. My foot is pretty stiff when I get started, but loosens up after about 5 minutes and I can walk at a pretty good pace now. I swim every day, or at least do some exercises in the pool to loosen up my foot and work on getting it “unstuck” and fluid motion. Biking is great. I barely feel it at all. Not doing any hills or anything, but I can pull my 2 kids in the bike trailer behind me.
(For those of you who know I live in Canada and wonder: hmmm… biking??? swimming??? in 3 feet of snow??? I am on vacation with my family in sunny Florida. Yay! A wonderful break from the cold, and great for activity & rehab!
I did go for a walk on the beach a couple days ago (which is what my PT told me NOT to do, but I was feeling great). Well, I’m still paying for that with soreness. PT said that the sand is not firm enough to support my heel from going below my toes, so too much stretching. Ouch. But I’ve been icing and I think it’ll be OK.
Also, I tried golfing 9 holes, with a cart. I was pretty sore after that also, due to the uneven ground of searching the bushes & climbing in and out of sand traps. I guess for those of you who are better golfers and can actually stay on the fairway, you probably won’t have as much of a problem with golfing! IT was totally worth it though. I had so much fun. But I think I will wait to play again.
Physical Therapy:
I had been going to PT twice a week up until last week. Now I will be going once a week. Mostly I am doing strengthening exercises for my calf such as walking on my tippy toes, balancing just on my heels to just on my toes… Strengthening for my hip such as hip hikes, balancing on my bad leg moving my other leg in different directions… And stretching. I am also getting ice and stim after my PT session.
OUCH:
My knee of my bad leg is pretty sore now. It clicks every step I take. I guess from my different walking gait, or maybe weakened muscles, or tight muscles. Who knows. I am doing lots of hip exercises and leg stretches to try to fix this. My knee bothers me more than my achilles at this point. Hopefully it will go away soon, as some of the other aches & pains from relearning how to walk properly have come and gone.
Family, Christmas, etc;
I’m very excited to be spending Christmas in Florida this year with my husband and kids. We’re having so much fun swimming, biking, walking, playing at the playground together, shopping at the outlet malls. I’m so grateful that I’m already 4 months into this healing process so I can participate in all the fun stuff we do together.
We are meeting up with some of my husband’s family in Orlando for Disney, SeaWorld, etc… just after Christmas. Can’t wait to see my 3-year old’s reaction to all this, and seeing her cousins too! The baby will love it too, just because she does whatever her big sister does…
So happy holidays to everyone. And happy healing.
Great positive post….sounds like you are coming along well. Definitely doing more than I am at six months out. I think I’ll pick up the swimming as running as been VERY slow to come back.
Glad things are going so well….Happy Holidays.
I am 4 months post op like you, except this was after a rerupture.
I tried dancing 2 weeks ago (it’s a slow jive) and like you had more of a problem with my knee than Achilles. My knees have always been bad lately and I think the lack of exercise has left that knee very weak. I plan to get on the exercise bike a bit more before jiving again.
Chris
I’m at 10 weeks and appreciate the news from farther down the line. Good to know there is light at the end of the tunnel!
Hi Shelley, I haven’t posted for almost seven months. How are things going? We had our little girl 2 1/2 weeks ago. Her name is Kassandra and she was 8lbs 4 oz. Now that I am no longer pregnant I can get back in shape finally!! My tendon wasn’t particularly impressed with my 42 lb weight gain but I have already lost 30lbs, so the strain on it is gone. Are you playing basketball again yet? I am not going to join my slo-pitch team this year, since I haven’t really tested the strength of my achilles yet, and I am totally out of shape. Hope things are going well and the kids are great. Keep yourself out of trouble!