Boot the Boot

Yesterday was my first day that I was allowed to be out of the boot all day!

I've been working on weaning out of the boot for the last week and a half or so.

I still don't walk "normally", or what I would consider normal anyway.  I think that will just take time.  I move pretty slow when walking, and I have a little bit of a limp.  As the day goes on my limp starts to get a little worse.  I can't say that walking is necessarily painful, but my foot feels stiff and a unnatural. I still have plenty of hardware inside my foot that I am sure is not helping.  I don't know how long it will take until things start to feel normal again, but I can say that I'm just happy to be walking.  My arch still isn't ready to support my barefoot, so I need to have shoes on, preferably with an insert, to do any walking around.  I have been trying to stand up more in the shower, rather than using my gimp stool, but my right foot still feels slippery on the tile.  Like my foot can't grip onto the smooth surface or something, so I still need to steady myself on the wall.

I did have a follow-up appointment this week at TOSH.  They took a set of x-rays, and this is the very first time I've taken a weight bearing x-ray on my right foot!  I was a bit sore afterwards, since I had to be barefoot and my foot is still not ready for that.  The doctor indicated that everything looked great, and had me schedule surgery on December 15th to remove the two screws.  I was very specific that the surgery not conflict with the new Star Wars movie release, since I already have purchased our midnight tickets on opening night!  He confirmed that my plate will stay in, mostly because the navicular bone does not get a lot of blood supply and taking it out may cause it to just crumble.  Ain't nobody got time for that.  Also, all of the screws will stay in the plate as well.  I guess I'd always just assumed that they would come out.  I can feel them, and it bugs me, but I'm sure after a while my foot will just get used to it's permanent guests.  There is also a screw head that is across my Lisfranc joint (at the base of my 1st and 2nd metatarsals) that is poking my inside arch.  It's been increasingly painful as I start to increase walking without the boot.  It has been really tender the last few days.  When I mentioned this to the doctor, he pressed down on the area to confirm it was the screw and not anything else.  My yelp confirmed that yep, it's the screw.  Ow.  It was so sore that day after he did that.  Jerk!  Lol.  I'm glad that screw will be removed in a couple of weeks.

Thankfully, I've got a lot of vacation time banked at work, and I will use most of it for my surgery and my holiday vacation.  My co-workers unfortunately won't be seeing me much in the month of December!

For Black Friday, Nate and I splurged a bit and purchased a spin bike for our basement gym.  Since I can't run, I actually couldn't even really walk for exercise right now, I wanted something at home that I could do for sustainable cardio.  I really have been limited to lifting weights with my Power Blocks, or my TRX.  While I love both of those,  I need to do cardio (says the extra 20lbs I've put on since surgery!) and that is not really an option with strength training.

Even when I can start walking enough to increase my heart rate enough to the point of cardio, let me remind you that it is winter in Utah.  Not only is the air freezing cold, and the ground icy, but we have this lovely thing called inversion, when the cold air gets trapped in the mountain valley, along with all the smog and pollution.  It's quite disgusting, and breathing the air outside is not pleasurable.  Most of January and February, when the inversion is at its worst, I struggle to breathe and often have horrible sinus issues. Exercising outside just makes it that much worse.  Here's an example of the lovely crap the Salt Lake Valley gets to deal with for the majority of the winter:

  
I also had a birthday this week!  I'm now at the ripe old age of 32.  Nate got me a gorgeous necklace
that holds my wedding ring, and took me on a hot date to Ruth's Chris where I had the most phenomenal surf & turf.

The last time I got fancied up was for our anniversary in August.  I was still on my scooter, non-weight bearing and I had to keep my foot elevated most of the time.  It was great to be able to go out without having "special needs" and I could be a normal girl for a night out on the town!  It also made me reflect on how tough this year has been on me (and Nate) and I am so grateful that I had my best friend by my side the entire time and I realize that I could not have made it through this without him.

Weaning

Probably the biggest milestone ever this week.....

I am weaning out of the walking boot!

I started on Wednesday, being allowed 2-3 hours out of the boot and in my tennis shoes, and the rest of the day in the boot.  Every other day, I get to add an hour to the time I'm allowed out of the boot.  Wed & Thurs, I spent 2-3 hours out, Fri & Sat, I spent 4-5 hours out, and today I'm up to 6-7 hours!  As per the usual, I've just been told to listen to my foot and if it starts to hurt, I shouldn't push it.  If I am hurting by hour 5, I should just put the boot back on.  I don't have to hit those hours every day, only if the foot can tolerate it.  With my weaning schedule, I should be COMPLETELY out of the boot by next Saturday!  

Balance on my right side is still a bit of an issue.  Pretty much all of my PT exercises focus on that.  I'm getting better at my single leg stance, and the goal is to balance 20 seconds on my right side.  I am doing pretty good and can hit 20 seconds, or close enough.  I've added a couple of new exercises, including walking with a band around my ankles, and balancing on my right leg while rotating a ball around my foot.  I hate my balancing exercises!  I get a break next week from a PT session, since it is Thanksgiving week.  But, I still get to see Dr. Van Boerum on Wednesday to get x-rays and he will decide when my next surgery will be.

My posterior tibial tendon issue seems to have resolved itself.  I'm not really getting much pain there anymore, unless I'm really overdoing it.  I've just been careful with it, like I've been told to do, and it has apparently done the trick.  Other than that, I really have no real pain to report aside from having some knee pain if I spend too long walking around in the boot.

Walking barefoot has been getting a lot easier, although I still don't do it very much.  I've been working on standing up more in the shower, instead of sitting on my stool.  My balance is still not where I feel completely comfortable, so standing on wet, slippery tile in the shower gives me a little anxiety, so I use my stool about half the time.  There also isn't really a way that I can shave yet, without sitting down.  But bathing, and getting in and out of the tub is a breeze now and much better than it was a month ago.  That makes me so happy, because I absolutely love bathing in my oversized, jetted, champagne bubble, chromatherapy tub!

Things are starting to get back to normal, finally.  I still walk pretty slow, and have a pretty decent limp, but I don't need a scooter, crutches, or a boot anymore.  I no longer look like a cross between Hector Barbosa and LL Cool J.  Although it was pretty awesome to walk like a pirate every day!

                                    

I keep making really great progress!  It's gone much better than I had ever anticipated when I first was diagnosed with the injury.  I'm so happy I've kept this blog.  Sometimes I go back and read my entries from June and July and I remember how depressed and hopeless I felt.  This blog has really helped me process my feelings, and hopefully it has inspired or found its way to help at least one person going through this!  

Just Do It

8 weeks post-op this week!!  

I got the cutest card from my co-workers in the mail.  Cheered me up for sure!

If I'd had a less severe Lisfranc injury, I think I'd be able to start bearing weight this week.  But that damn little navicular had to get in the way of my potential!  It is the reason I am still not walking yet.  I guess that's what happens when you shatter it into 11 different pieces.

That's OK though, I still have had a week of progress so I can't really complain.  I've been doing my range of motion PT and it's to the point now where the foot is not really stiff anymore (at least when attempting those exercises).  My therapist said when I am pointing and flexing my toes that I should try to point and curl them like a ballerina as much as I can.  

So in my mind I visualize I look like this: 

                                             

                                          When in reality I look like this:

                                                                                  

Meh.

I also successfully made my goal of going in to the salon and getting my hair done.  I had been so nervous about it because I was just afraid how I was going to navigate on my scooter.  Turns out though, it was really easy!  I'm much more pro on my scooter than I give myself credit for.  I had to get into the chair once, out for a wash, and then back into the chair.  I shouldn't have been so nervous about it because I conquered it like a boss.  My hair stylist, who is FABULOUS by the way, gave me a stool to elevate my foot, and then I just sat there for a couple of hours while she played with my hair.  I got it darker for fall, and felt like I needed a change since I myself am going through so many changes in my life.

Bam!  I love this new color!

I am starting to use my crutches a little more.  I keep them down in my basement for when I go down there to workout in the home gym, so that I don't have to butt scoot around.  I've found that I'm about 100 times better on the crutches than I was when I first injured myself.  I guess I'm just really comfortable hopping around on my left leg, and I'm sure that it's super strong now so I can do a lot more with it.  I'm not going to use them as my primary mode of mobility but there are definitely nice to have around now that I'm not so afraid of them.

Perhaps the most exciting thing this week was the opening college football game of my Utah Utes against Michigan! Spoiler: the Utes won :)

(me and one of my best girls, Aimee - who made pumpkin chocolate chip cookies JUST FOR ME!... love her)

I have season tickets, but was really worried about having to hop up to my seat on the 35th row of the stadium.  So, we decided not to attend this game, but it didn't stop me from tailgating!  I got to get 12 hours of good, clean & dirty tailgating in my system.  I saw lots of friends.  Ate lots of food.  And drank lots of booze.  The only challenge was getting in to the port-a-potty on my own, so I needed help with that, but otherwise I just sat in my lawn chair with the foot elevated on my scooter.  People brought me food and drink as I requested it.  The port-a-potty trips definitely got more challenging as the night went on, the sun set, and I consumed more and more alcohol.   I have a light on my scooter so that helped.  At one point, it was so dark, that Nate lifted my scooter up and shined the light into the port-a-potty window for me so that I could see what I was doing.  How sweet is he?

It was the most depressing thing to see all of the other patrons heading to the game!  I met a couple of other people in casts, and one guy who had a boot like me, and was being pushed by friends in a wheelchair.  So, I'm determined to go to the game next week, and actually go inside the stadium to watch the game instead of from the tailgate lot.  I also bought some cute new boot accessories to decorate with my team colors.  

(my "Ute Boot")

YEAH!!  Go Utes!

I think I'd say to anyone out there reading this, debating on whether or not to do something with your broken foot (like go to a game, or a hair salon, or visit friends, or a road trip, or what have you)...my advice is to JUST DO IT!  It's so worth it in the end.  I immediately regretted selling my tickets once I got to the tailgate and found how much I was able to move around and do things (even if I required help).  I am done putting my life on hold or settling for less just because I've got a Lisfranc injury!

The Happiest 5k

The Color Run is known as the Happiest 5k.  No times.  No judgement.  Just go out there and have fun.

Nate got home from New York on Friday morning.  Hooray!  I was so happy to have him home.  He hadn't seen my boot or foot yet since he was out of town for my appointment.  So, we went home and immediately "played doctor" ;)  I took my boot off and was showing him my range of motion exercises.  He pulled up my video from Tuesday and compared the two and gave me a passing grade.  I also showed him my muscle atrophy, the source of all my crying and tears for the past week.  He immediately burst out laughing and exclaimed how cute my little chicken leg was.  All this crying I did, and he was laughing?  Then I realized, had he been home for the initial big reveal of the foot, he would have done the same thing, and my reaction would have been more of a comical one rather than an upsetting one.  He just has this uncanny ability to turn negative things into a positive for me, and remind me how things are going to get better and I don't need to worry about it.  So I stopped my mopiness about my atrophy and moved on to other more important things, like getting ready for the Color Run!

We picked up my wheelchair Friday night and headed up to the Color Run in downtown Salt Lake City on Saturday morning.  I was really sad I wasn't able to run it, let alone walk it, but I was really excited to be doing something "active" and in my element for the first time since that fateful day in June.  I thought I'd be embarrassed by the wheelchair but it was actually kind of awesome.  I for sure got a lot of attention.  Although, the first part of the morning was a little rough going.  We had parked in the parking garage of the SLC Library, which was right around the corner of the starting area for the race.  As my luck would have it, the elevator was not working!!  So, I hopped out of my wheelchair and with Nate's help I hobbled/hopped up 3 flights of stairs and we made our way to the festival.  That was quite the workout!  There was a Zumba instructor on the stage and all of these people were over there doing Zumba.  Ah, it pained my heart.  I haven't been to a Zumba class in about 2 months.  I used to go every week and shake my ass with my ladies.

I met up with my Mom, and her husband Dave, and friend Cheryl, as well as my sister-in-law Jessica, and her husband Todd, and my niece Clara for Team Sparkle Motion!!  Nate pushed me in my wheelchair anywhere I wanted to go, and I first I was rather disturbed by the fact that I couldn't control my destination.  But that was over quickly and I succumbed to his direction.  We hopped in the starting line and off we went!  Everyone walked and kept pace with the wheelchair girl as Nate pushed me. It was really hard for me to judge pace though.  Was it a good pace or a leisurely pace?  I have no idea. Clara thought it was the most amazing thing and wanted to ride in my lap versus her stroller.  I loved having a passenger in my chair (although strangers kept thinking she was my daughter) and she was so excited when we rolled through the color stations.  I actually got a good quad workout keeping her balanced in my lap so there was that!  The weather was beautiful, and the race was really fun.  I was really thankful for all of my family and friends that supported me and made it possible for me to still participate in the race.  I could not have made it this far without all of them.  It did a lot for my spirits.  And we got crazy decked out in color!!

(before color!)

(during color - wheelchair selfies!)

 (after color!)

My foot was pretty angry and swollen after the race, since it was kind of at a downward angle in the chair, and it took us about an hour to finish.  So I went home, elevated and stretched it (and thank goodness the elevator was working on the way back to the car in the parking garage), and it was good to go afterwards!  I also coughed up color for quite a while after the race so next time I'll be sure to wear a bandana or some type of cover over my nose and mouth! 

I also got some "boot bling" this week, a leopard print sock that I can fit on the inside lining of my boot and a few red flowers that I can attach to my boot straps.  I can now have some fanciness to the gimp life!  Yeah!

My big milestone next week is seeing the physical therapist on Wednesday.  I feel like I'm making good progress on my range of motion, but I don't have any idea where I should be.  I take my boot off 4-5 times a day to work on the stretches and I feel it getting less stiff and less painful every day.  Yay!  Although, when I move my toes (well attempt to move my toes) and I move my foot around, I can feel the metal grinding around in there.  It doesn't hurt, but it is a really uncomfortable feeling.  The tops of my toes are still pretty numb.  Hopefully I will get feeling back one day.  My incisions are starting to heal pretty well.  I've been using an exfoliating bar I got from Lush that has porridge and oats in it to gently exfoliate the foot in the shower and I think that is really helping with my skin.  It's starting to look less scary and Frankenfooty.

A Case of the Sads

This week has actually been kind of rough!  On Monday, I got my cast off, and I was so excited!

FREEDOM!

Now, I'm in my boot.  The doctor says I should wear my boot 23 out of 24 hours, so I get 1 hour total during the day to shower, do my stretching exercises and give my foot a break.  One thing I did not expect was how upsetting it would be to look at my leg/foot.  I've lost so much muscle, it looks like a little chicken leg.  I've tried taking pictures of it but it just doesn't do it justice.  It brings me to tears to look at it!  The fugliness doesn't bother me - my foot can be ugly forever; I don't care about that.  I try to do my stretching exercises and it takes a lot of effort to get my foot flexed into the neutral position.  Its such a simple move that is so hard to do.  Not to mention it hurts trying to get it there!  It just makes me think how painful physical therapy is going to be, and learning to walk again.  My navicular got totally f*cked in the accident, so I'm supposed to be mainly focusing on pointing and flexing my foot, and not so much side to side motion because it'll put too much stress on my navicular bone.  It is in a delicate condition.  The doctor also told me that before surgery, they were concerned about my navicular bone dying.  Blood flow can apparently get cut off to that bone when it is injured, and it can die if the injury is severe enough.  But, mine has pulled through..... phew.

(took a short video of my range of motion, or lack thereof)

Speaking of, I did make an appointment with the Lisfranc specialist next week, so I'll see what she has to say about recovery and how far I should be pushing it.

I did not get cleared to swim, either, and that's what I really was hoping for this time!  The doctor is concerned about any weight at all on the foot, even in the water.  And I can't immerse my foot in water with the incisions still scabbed over, so no hot tubs or baths for me still!  I'm so sad because about a week before my injury I bought about 10 different bath bombs from Lush that I have not been able to use.  Bathing is one of my most favorite things to do.   Bathing with a cocktail or a glass of my home-brewed beer is even better!

My husband is also in New York, and I miss him!  Normally he'd be here to cheer me up or talk some sense into me so that I snap out of the funk.  But we have both been so busy with work, our schedules are not lining up so we haven't had a chance to talk much, and no Skyping.    He is sad that I shaved my leg though, because he wanted to "pet it"...which made me laugh.  He gets back on Friday morning though so I don't have too long to wait!

(picture from his hotel, looking at the WTC)

Mom has been taking great care of me while he has been gone.  She has helped me cook, clean, take care of the animals, and tend to the garden. She has also been my source of entertainment. It has been really nice having her around!  

I'm also doing the Color Run this weekend, as long as I can secure my wheelchair situation.  I have some friends and family doing the race and I am not about to miss out just because I've got a broken foot!

(boot shot!)

Das Boot

Today I graduated from cast to boot!

My mom has graciously taken on the task of being my caretaker while Nate is on his business trip to New York.  So that means she got to take me to my appointment!  We dropped him off early in the morning at the airport, and then made our way to my appointment at the TOSH Hospital for my 6 week post-op check-up.

The nurse brought me back to the doctor's office, and immediately got to removing my cast.  She wheeled in what looked like a Shop-Vac R2D2 type looking contraption with a saw attachment (eeeeep....Wanna play a game?) and set to work.  She told me that the saw would cut through the cast but it would not cut through the padding.  She said when the saw hit the padding, it would feel kind of weird.  And it did, it kind of tickled, but kind of didn't...it was an odd sensation.  

It took her all of about 2 minutes to get it off (she was a pro), and Frankenfoot 2.0 was revealed!

My toes and surrounding foot area are still pretty swollen.  Granted, the swelling has come down quite a bit, but they are still very visibly puffy.  I thought the swelling would have gone down more than it did, but the doctor said it was normal to have swelling for up to a year after the surgery.  Once the cast was off, it was time to get a set of x-rays.  I rode Trumpy down the hall into the x-ray room, confirmed I wasn't pregnant, and had 3 sets of piggy pictures taken.

(scooter shot!)

It felt so weird to have the cast off.  There was no resistance when I was lifting my leg up and down so it didn't take quite as much effort to do it.  But I also felt like my foot was vulnerable and exposed.  I was surprised that I could actually set my foot down on the x-ray table and not really have any pain.  I thought it was feeling and looking pretty good!

I got back into the exam room and the nurse then took out my stitches.  I was sitting up straight ready to watch her do her magic.  She told me that if I was squeamish at all that I might want to lay down.  Since I usually get close to passing out when I have blood drawn, or cut myself, I decided that she was right, laid back, and went to my mind palace.  It hurt way more than I thought it would getting the stitches removed.  I'd read online about how it feels (always a perfect source of reliable information) and most people had said they either couldn't feel it at all or it felt like a rubberband popping on your skin.  Well, maybe I don't have that great of pain tolerance because it frickin' hurt!

Once the stitches were all gone, I then got to see the doctor.  I got to see a new angle of the pins in my foot and it probably explains why it hurt so bad the other week when I lost my balance and came down on my heel.  There is a pin going vertical in my foot, and the doctor said putting any weight on it at all would be really painful.  The bad news is, I will have to have two surgeries.  I have a set of pins, and a couple of sets of screws.  The pins will need to come out first, and that surgery will happen in about 6 weeks (12 weeks post op).  I scheduled that appointment for October 12th.  The screws won't be ready to come out though, so I'm looking at another surgery mid-November.  I was really hoping to just have 1 more surgery, but 'tis not to be.

(that little guy - oh don't worry about that little guy)

The skin underneath my cast was pretty gross.  It was all dry and peeling, and still had mud from Spartan and that yucky yellow iodine disinfectant stuff that they slather on right before surgery.   My right leg also looked like a wet noodle.  A furry wet noodle.  

(furry wet noodle on the left)

The doctor said that the holes from where my stitches were needed to heal, so no showering or shaving for 24 hours.  WHAT?!?!  This was clearly the worst news of the day.  Of the century.  I was so looking forward to having a date with my shower tonight.  A nice, long, hot shower, washing, and shaving my leg.  Then lotioning it up with some lovely smelling body butter I purchased for this very affair.  But, 'tis not be!  Also, the doctor said not to use lotion for a little while where there was lots of dead skin.  Or it would just turn in to a dead skin slurry.  That's a lovely visual.

I got fitted for the boot.  There were no color options.  I clarified that and also complained.  But the doctor just told me to bedazzle it.  Bedazzle it I shall!  I am going to bedazzle the sh*t out of it.

The doctor also wanted me to work on range of motion exercises.  Well, 2 exercises.  Just pointing and flexing my toes (trying to get my foot into neutral position), and rotating my foot side to side.  We tried it.  It hurt.  Well, it hurt so good.  I could almost get to neutral.  I'll work on that.  He gave me a script for 2 sessions with a Lisfranc specialist physical therapist if I felt I needed help with the exercises.  I'm going to take full advantage of it, because I want the best possible outcome.

 All done!  We then headed off to breakfast place that I wanted to try (Penny Ann's Cafe) and I had a bacon waffle.  It was totally amazing and great cast removal food.  I'm not a food reviewer but my friend over at SLC Food Radar is!  He did a great review on Penny Ann's. Anyway!  Bacon waffle!!  Mmmm...Bacon.

Bacon makes everything better.