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Himeji Castle

Six Weeks Out

Back in December, I mentioned that I was going in for arthroscopic hip surgery. That was delayed until February, which was exactly six weeks ago today. The good news is that the operation went really well. The doc found exactly what he expected to find, which was a piece of torn cartilage smack bang in the middle of the hip joint. It was removed, and the resultant cyst drained, and I got to go home that same day. The best news was that even right after the op, with pain blooming all over my hip, I realised I could do things I hadn't been able to do for over a year, like lie flat in bed or sit in my recliner and watch TV. This was pretty great news.

I took two weeks off work, and stayed at home chomping painkillers and watching movies. I think I watched about 25 of them, starting with the high quality ones like The Dark Knight, and working my way steadily downwards towards The Mummy 3. I read books, I played PS3 games, and I slept a lot. The pain slowly subsided, and some mobility returned. This served mostly to allow me to overdo things and make myself sore again, but that tends to be the general cycle of recovery.

I went back to work on crutches after two weeks, which wasn't great. My job is only ten minutes walk away, but that's ten minutes for a normal fit person who doesn't mind stairs and the occasional gentle slope. I slowly worked up to not using the crutches in the office and at home, and even walked home without the crutches once, about four weeks from op day. This did not go well. Recovery was fairly quick though, which was another thing that had changed since the operation. Before, I would tweak things and stay in pain town for several days. Now it seems to last for about 48 hours, which sounds about right for minor inflammatory injuries.

Things continue to trend upwards, albeit very slowly. The doctor had quoted six weeks recovery originally, but that's a pretty standard line. I had the same period bandied about when I had my knee scoped years ago, and that turned out to be complete rubbish. It was weeks after then that I finally started getting on top of things, and I expect the same will be true this time around. I will probably call the doc if I'm still on crutches in another four weeks, but for now I'm feeling pretty good.