It all started with a hinge brace. A T Scope® Premier Post-Op Knee Brace to be exact.
Seven months ago I tore my ACL and MCL in a softball game. Two days later I was given The Brace. At first, I was excited, I could walk without crutches and it would provide a nice topic of conversation. Then it got hot. For the next three months I had a giant piece of black plastic stuck to my leg; it constantly slid down my leg, defeating the purpose of wearing it, and to make matters worse, it was full of sweat.
At the beginning of Month 2, I had my first major surgery. The first week I realized that I hated moving and pain medication. The second week I realized I hated stairs. Not only did it hurt to bend my leg more than 85°, but putting pressure on my leg while bent caused a pain lance down my shin. I soon learned to avoid stairs and hills or anything else could possibly made my leg hurt–including my physical therapy exercises. The first few weeks after my surgery I was religiously doing my stretches, slowly gaining back my flexibility and strength. I vividly remember the day that you could finally tell that I was flexing my quad, I sent a video to nearly everyone I knew! …show more content…
In physical therapy, we moved on from sitting to standing exercises. I was now doing one legged squats and band walks instead of leg raises. What I didn't expect was for them to hurt so much. To build up my quad muscle, which had atrophied after my surgery, all of these exercises were done in a sitting or squatting position. This strained my patellar muscle, which was still weak from the graft they took during surgery.
Blah blah blah blah It hurt, I stopped doing stuff
Now it sits, carelessly thrown in the backseat of my car from the moment they told me I didn’t need to wear it
Seven months ago I tore my ACL and MCL in a softball game. Two days later I was given The Brace. At first, I was excited, I could walk without crutches and it would provide a nice topic of conversation. Then it got hot. For the next three months I had a giant piece of black plastic stuck to my leg; it constantly slid down my leg, defeating the purpose of wearing it, and to make matters worse, it was full of sweat.
At the beginning of Month 2, I had my first major surgery. The first week I realized that I hated moving and pain medication. The second week I realized I hated stairs. Not only did it hurt to bend my leg more than 85°, but putting pressure on my leg while bent caused a pain lance down my shin. I soon learned to avoid stairs and hills or anything else could possibly made my leg hurt–including my physical therapy exercises. The first few weeks after my surgery I was religiously doing my stretches, slowly gaining back my flexibility and strength. I vividly remember the day that you could finally tell that I was flexing my quad, I sent a video to nearly everyone I knew! …show more content…
In physical therapy, we moved on from sitting to standing exercises. I was now doing one legged squats and band walks instead of leg raises. What I didn't expect was for them to hurt so much. To build up my quad muscle, which had atrophied after my surgery, all of these exercises were done in a sitting or squatting position. This strained my patellar muscle, which was still weak from the graft they took during surgery.
Blah blah blah blah It hurt, I stopped doing stuff
Now it sits, carelessly thrown in the backseat of my car from the moment they told me I didn’t need to wear it