Wednesday, July 08, 2015

Day 8: Tylenol is my friend

Well, things have fallen into a pattern here at Chez Phouka -- get up, slither down the stairs to sit in the chair, and get waited on hand and foot. I feel like royalty.

Oh, wait -- not quite. The Adorable Husband had to go back to work yesterday and I've been whining about how hard this is by myself. I didn't realize how much he was doing for me -- just the random fetching of ice, tylenol, diet coke and the rest is a big deal. I have to plan head more and make one trip. Luckily my fabulous scooter has a basket!

I'm not really in much pain any more -- just random zrrrps! along the back of my heel and a dull ache. It's more annoying/uncomfortable than actually painful as long as I don't put any pressure on it. I was taking only a half a pain pill every four to six hours and that seemed fine, and now tylenol seems to be handling things well enough. I get a bit uncomfortable, sort of twitchy and achy, but nothing bad at all. I still keep my foot elevated as much as possible. Having the recliner and a pillow are just the trick!

I think this has really gone a lot better than I thought it was going to. A lot less pain. The annoyance factor of not being able to put my foot down at all is pretty high, though. Another 3-4 weeks of that, I think. Hopefully at my appointment on Friday they will take off the cast/splint and put me in the boot. That is more secure and I'll feel less worried about whacking things -- although, I will also probably feel less paranoid about resting my foot on the floor, which will still be a no-no.

The hardest part is really just doing the normal daily stuff -- getting up and going to the bathroom, getting more diet coke, answering the door, all of those things take a long time and are tiring. I sort of took for granted that I could just go up and down stairs..not at the moment. Up = crawling, and down = scooting. I could try using crutches, but I'm such a remarkable klutz I'd probably kill myself. I've never been good at crutches.


I did buy an iWalk crutch on the recommendation of another achilles-surgery blogger -- it's sort of a pirate peg-leg affair that is supposed to replace a pair of crutches and be more stable/easier to walk on. I've tried it out a few times, but the scooter is way easier, to be honest. The girl in the promo picture makes it look so easy, right? Not quite.  I did practice with it a bit before surgery,and I think once I'm in a boot isntead of just this splint thing, I may try it for longer distances. If I can stomp upstairs in the thing instead of crawling up on my knees, that will be a big win! Plus, I get to practive my pirate 'yaaaaaar!'. I might even have an eyepatch around her somewhere.

So, not much to report. More --probably including gruesome stitch pictures - -after my appointment on Friday!



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