Surgery is now two weeks in the rear-view mirror

I'm at the two week mark from labrum tear repair, femoral osteochondroplasty, acetabular osteochondroplasty, and psoas tenotomy.  (I know, big words!)   This surgery has about an 80% success rate, which makes it a mental as well as physical recovery, because with every little pain or nag I'm asking myself if I am in the 80% or the 20%.   We're just going to have to keep the faith. :)

A recap of recovery over the last two weeks:

For about 3-4 days after surgery, I had an intense, sharp pain in my groin whenever I would attempt to move my leg.   This completely resolved, and thankfully I was able to stop the narcotic pain killers.  This was mostly from the psoas release.   Now if I attempt to lift my leg (i.e. use my hip flexors),  my leg mostly just doesn't move.   If I keep at trying to lift my leg, I will start to get a nagging pain in the groin, but nothing sharp like after surgery.   

I've been told it can take up to three months before you can engage the psoas fully and it's certainly the most challenging part of rehab so far.   For instance, if I am standing on my crutches, I can move my foot about 1-2" off the ground.   So I can walk OK, but if I need to put on a pair of pants, I need to sit down, physically move my leg up and into the pants leg.

My lower back was seriously irritated from like day 5 to mid-second week and eventually I needed to start up the pain killers again.  It's calmed down a lot, with much less sciatica involvement, but still not 100%.   This is not uncommon post-surgery but given my history, I would have been more surprised if my back didn't react somehow.   Now that I am able to walk in the pool, things are better.  As I've mentioned before, sitting for long periods is just not good for low back issues.

I started physical therapy three days after surgery.  I had my first check-in with the surgeon's PA at the one week mark and the stitches came out then.  As soon as the stitches were out, I was able to start pool therapy and the rest of my sessions for May will be in the water.

My pain right now in the operated hip is just about zero.  After PT, I will have a little groin soreness but it never lasts too long.   Today was one of those stormy days that I would have felt in my hip and I felt nothing, so for now, things are going in the right direction!

Psoas the World Turns

One of the things planned for my surgery is a psoas "lengthening", where the surgeon cuts the muscle partially.  When it heals, it makes the muscle longer in length.   There's are a number of people who have had this done and say that it was the most difficult part of their surgery recovery.  It takes a long time to get that muscle strength back and it's a critical muscle in lifting your leg, like when you go up stairs.  Both of my hips will "crack" or "snap" pretty often, which is the psoas snapping across the hip.

My MRI shows that the psoas is crammed right up against my labrum, and could potentially be part of the reason why my labrum tore.  Like this:

This psoas has caused me a ridiculous amount of trouble over the years.  It's always unhappy and spasming, causing an immense amount of lower back pain.   It also resulted in crappy posture - I would slouch over towards that hip when sitting... you could call me Quasimodo.   Physical therapy worked through a lot of that earlier last year, after yet another bout of back pain.   Interestingly, I've always hated how I slouch in photos, but I've since realized that it was a compensation for that psoas as well.

What happens when one psoas is far too tight:

A few of the millions of photos of me in that same position:

On one hand, I am really hopeful that the psoas release will finally give me more functional motion through that hip, will "straighten" me out a bit, and will resolve many of my back issues.  None of the conservative treatments up to this point have fixed it fully, though routine massages and PT have certainly helped keep things at bay.   Stretching just makes my hip extremely unhappy.

And on the other hand, I am really nervous about the recovery.

News flash - spring has arrived!

Today we hit 70 degrees.  The last time we hit 70 was wayyyyy back on October 10th.   A long, grueling, miserable 6 months of winter in between.   Tomorrow and Monday are supposed to be just as beautiful out, hooray!

I got out on the bike for 15 miles.  I started off in a jacket but I was down to shorts and a short sleeved jersey by the half way point!  I intended to do 20 but the hip was bothering me enough that I figured I should cut it short.   I have another ride planned tomorrow, a little longer at 25 miles, so there was no need to push it today.   I am pretty sure the deep knee bends I did to get the chain greased and the tires pumped up tweaked things a bit - it's always the little stuff!

My pretty bike!

I hung out on my inversion table after the ride.  I purchased it a few months ago but hadn't gotten around to setting it up - which was a feat with its million pieces and hard to read instructions.   It's supposed to help with disc issues, so I figure getting some traction in before surgery might help alleviate any post-surgery low back pain flare ups (likely some wishful thinking, but it can't hurt).

Today is also day 1 of the freezer stocking cooking!  Spaghetti sauce/meatballs and chili is on the docket.  I'll freeze most of it and save enough for a meal or two during the week.