Physical Therapy- overview

When I decided to start this blog, one main idea I had for it was to journal my knee recovery from start to finish. But since the injury happened in November (2010) I've had to go back in my mind and try to remember how things happened, and I wanted to do it in order. So now I am playing catch up, so I can record my recovery as it is happening. I'm almost there. I've done physical therapy three separate times since my initial injury, so here is a quick overview of that; and then I can finally move on to what I am doing now. Hooray for catching up!

It feels like I've been doing physical therapy for my knee since forever. I started it back in January or February, before I even had my MRI. It went well enough, and the PT center and therapist were great, but I wasn't getting any better. Well after the MRI, my surgeon pulled me out because without surgery, the therapy wasn't going to do much for me.

So after my first surgery (when they didn't fix the ACL) I was sent back to therapy. They were hoping that I would be able to strengthen the muscles around my knee (quads, hamstring) and they would stabilize my knee, taking over for the ACL. I went to the same place, but ended up with a different therapist, which is fine because she is fantastic! For the first month or so the therapy was helping a lot, but once I recovered from surgery, my progress pretty much came to a stand still. So I was pulled out of therapy again, to wait for surgery.

When I went back after my ACL reconstruction, I requested the same PT that I had before because we'd already built up a good rapport and I didn't want to have to switch again. When I started back to therapy, I was just about 2 weeks post surgery. I did a lot of leg lifts (several ways), started on the exercise bike- just pedaling forward then backward, because I couldn't bend my knee enough to go all the way around, and worked on getting my knee to bend by putting a towel around my foot and using that to help me bend my knee. I didn't have to worry about getting my knee to straighten, because it already did that (yay)- which I guess some people have problems with. I started of being able to bend my knee around 60-70 degrees. As my recovery progresses I get new exercises- steps, balancing, squats on a Total Gym.

At this point I am able to get my leg all the way around on the stationary bike, my knee bends 118 degrees, and I am getting better on the stairs. My favorite PT activity- balancing on my bad leg, and throwing a 2lb medicine ball onto a trampoline and catching it. It's my newest exercise, and the most fun. My least favorite- leg lifts. They are just boring.

I plan on doing small updates on my physical therapy once a week. For me, it is the fun part of recovery.