Ed,
Thanks for the kind words. I seem to be ahead of schedule - I was able to walk to the post office and back yesterday, slowly and carefully. The PO is .6 mile route. Got there, stopped at 7-11 to get snacks and cool off a bit, and ate while walking back. Good for day 5 I believe. Did the exercises, iced the knee multiple times, went to bed around 8:30/9 PM, got up once for a half hour, then woke up about 6:40AM (!) Tired.
On another front, I'll add this: Did the GC Rim to Rim hike years ago, starting down the Bright Angel Trail (and sorry for all the navel-gazing in this post...) https://socalhiker.smugmug.com/Hiking/041699-Grand-Canyon-Hike
Bill Anderson
On Wed, May 28, 2025 at 3:52 PM Ed Leafe ed@leafe.com wrote:
On May 28, 2025, at 15:04, Bill Anderson billand88@gmail.com wrote:
Sorry for the late notice, had a total knee replacement done two days
after
the release...
I had my left knee done in 2019, and last year it started to fail, so I had it re-done last November. One thing I learned is that all the pain from rehabbing the joint is WORTH IT! The failure was from the cement used to hold the joint in the bone, and not anything I did. Until it failed, it worked great, and I credit the physical therapy for that. As my surgeon said, expect six weeks of hell!
This time around it was better because the doc recommended "pre-hab" before the surgery. I had lost a lot of flexion in the joint because of the failure, and they worked to increase that as much as possible beforehand. I didn't understand why at first, thinking that we were just going to get rid of that old joint anyway, but it's needed to stretch the tendons, ligaments, and other assorted parts so that they have a head start on where they need to be post-surgery.
Last month my wife and I did a road trip through the American southwest, and that included a stop at the Grand Canyon. We hiked the first 1.5 miles of the Bright Angel trail, which might not sound like much, but that is an elevation change of 1,200 ft (around 360 meters), which is equivalent to walking the stairs on a 120-story building. While my lungs were working hard to keep up, the knee was no problem!
-- Ed Leafe
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