{"id":49,"date":"2011-06-01T03:15:26","date_gmt":"2011-06-01T03:15:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/greg.lyonkingdom.com\/?p=49"},"modified":"2011-06-05T18:26:27","modified_gmt":"2011-06-05T18:26:27","slug":"march-7th-prehab","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/greg.lyonkingdom.com\/?p=49","title":{"rendered":"Prehab: March 7th"},"content":{"rendered":"

After it was determined that I didn\u2019t have any bone-fragments floating around in my knee, it was time to get it working again.\u00a0 It is really scary how quickly I lost range of motion and muscle strength while I was immobilized and non-weight bearing.\u00a0 Certainly, some of the loss of range of motion was due to the ongoing swelling, but a lot of it was just \u2018use it or lose it\u2019\u2026and I\u2019d lost it.<\/p>\n

\"snowy<\/a>

snowy-rain is fun for kids but not for crutches...<\/p><\/div>\n

At my doctor\u2019s appointment earlier in the day the doctor said to start physical therapy immediately; I found that there was an opening later the same day and took it. \u00a0Also, I\u2019d been given a flexible brace to wear instead of the leg immobilizer.\u00a0 It was one of the neoprene types with two metal hinges to keep my leg flexing in only the correct direction.\u00a0 It felt good to get out of the full-leg immobilizer, but my leg did not feel sturdy at all.\u00a0 As I\u2019d find out over the next several days, tightening it enough to provide support meant that it gave me bruises\u2026a tradeoff for sure.<\/p>\n

In the early afternoon Kammy drove me back to Tria to meet my physical therapist.\u00a0 Right off the bat he wanted to get some baselines: He asked about level of pain (low) and then had a look at my leg.\u00a0 He had me get out of the leg brace and checked my range of motion.\u00a0 My hyper-extension could only go to about 5 degrees (-5, or same as the other leg is the target).\u00a0 Flexing my knee barely got it to 90 degrees (135 or so is the target).<\/p>\n

Next, he had me try a few things to get a feel for where I was strength-wise.\u00a0 He had me do \u2018quadsets\u2019 where I just had my leg extended in front of me (with a small towel rolled under the knee) and tried to tense my quads and push down into the towel.\u00a0 It was difficult to get a nice quick firing of my quad at all, let alone push down.\u00a0 He said I should work up to 15 of these.\u00a0 He also had me do leg-raises.\u00a0 Lying flat on my back, I bent my unaffected leg about 90 degrees, then tense my quads and raise my affected leg about 45 degrees.\u00a0 I could do this one OK, but tired quickly.\u00a0 I should work my way up to 30 of those.\u00a0 He also had me start on something called passive extension.\u00a0 This one sounded easy; lying on my back I just put a rolled towel under my heel and relax, letting gravity straighten my leg as much as possible.<\/p>\n

It was pure hell!\u00a0 (OK I exaggerate, but it really did hurt!).\u00a0 I should work up to being able to lie there for 5 minutes on this one.\u00a0 Next he wanted me to do \u2018heel-slides\u2019.\u00a0 For these I wrap a towel around the arch of my foot with my affected leg extended, and then pull the towel to help my leg bend as much as possible.\u00a0 I\u2019d do 20 of these, trying to get more flex as the days went by.\u00a0 Another flexing exercise had me sitting in a chair or on a kitchen counter, table or other sturdy object.\u00a0 I\u2019d use my good leg to flex my bad one as far as I could, with 20 repetitions too.<\/p>\n

He sent me off with instructions to do these exercises 3 times a day, and work my way up to the recommended reps or time for each.\u00a0 The first night I managed the following of each:<\/p>\n