Reflecting on my Posts

Why did I dedicate 2 posts to my recovery, back to back? This is the question I asked myself.

While the Olympic games are being played, it has made me think. Many people are receiving medals for their  great efforts. All I have to show after a year of "work" and diligence is the possibility to get back to my former activity, although that's a lot more than some people can do. Not everyone literally climbs mountains. And some never get back what they lost.

I knew I would get back into my alpine activities but it amazed me that I really had to wait about a full year for that to happen, like the doctor told me from the onset. You always think it's going to faster for you: the young, active person. I also needed to keep up my physical therapy with a regular schedule of work, a house  to care for and other activities of everday life. Finding time for everything wasn't always easy.

It took me longer to get my tendon in order than my friends to give birth to babies, which they are in the process of doing now but got pregnant months after my surgery. It's ironic because most of us consider the waiting period during pregnancy to be long. My achilles tendon recovery was longer.

This is not the first time I have had surgery and had to go through therapy. It's actually the third over the last 15 years. I am probably a bit frustrated that I have had so much of surgery and injuries and recovery. Yet I know there are other people who have been through more. But that's in my head. My gut doesn't always care about those cases. Maybe  that's why getting over this operation is such a big deal for me.

I have to admit that my tendon still isn't perfect. It still feels raw when I push it. I am still doing physical therapy to help it along. I think I'll need to do that until I can truly lift up my body onto the tips of my left toes, a movement that I only do partially at the moment. August 4th was a year after surgery but I think I need another 3 months to get everything back in shape.

And then one day, I won't have to think about it anymore. The tendon will just perform exactly as it should.

PT Land

Life has been filled with physical therapy sessions since February, 6 months after surgery. As soon as walking wasn't painful anymore, I joined my gym again to build back my tendon and wimpy leg. It's quite a lot of work. I am doing 2/3 sessions of 1.5 hrs a week. In fact, I need to leave for one now.

You wouldn't believe how slow it is to build back muscle tone after not walking properly for 4-5 months. There is also the concern that the tendon itself is quite healed but weak, too, so I am dedicating a lot of time to re-energizing its every aspect and move...and neural brain-muscle connections. "If you don't lose it, you lose it." This applies even to a tendon's response to brain impulses, supposedly. And I lost those impulses for several months.

Then my dog started in his own round of physical therapy for an arthritic leg last month. That has been another 5 hrs a week hauling him to sessions 20 miles outside of town. That progress is slow, too.

I've been learning tons about PT, to say the very least: laser, ultrasound, exercises, balance issues, heat packs, massages, exercises with household objects as well as strange instruments, etc.

I'll let you know more soon . But for now, I've got to go and stimulate my tendon tonight at the gym. I just started to get my first signs of a solid calf muscle last week. It still has a long way to go, but I am so excited. It's a physical and tangible sign of progress.

If only I could blog from the gym bikes.....

The Wonders of Socialized Medicine

While some people are complaining back home in the US about the planned "Obamacare", I am relishing the benefits of European socialized medicine.

It turns out that my achilles tendon was completely ruptured from jumping to the beats of Cindy Lauper, as explained in my recent post. An ultrasound on Tuesday sealed my fate. I needed surgery and fast. Within 36 hours of seeing the ultrasound results, I was on a hospital bed undergoing surgery.

Yesterday I came home from the hospital after orthopedic surgery lasting 1.5 hrs and just over 24 hours in the hospital in post-op recovery. I now have 5 stitches behind my ankle, nylon thread and special mesh holding my tendon together and a cast up to my knee. I may not be happy about being immobile for the rest of the summer and into the fall, but the service has been great and free.

This is not my first bit of surgery. I have already had 2 major operations on my arm in the US. I know what surgery and recovery involves. I also know that as a US patient, not only do you have to deal with the physical ramifications of surgery but also financial woes. Even as an insured US citizen, you risk paying for surgery out-of-pocket. That's exactly what I had to do years ago when I reinjured my arm. The insurance company did not provide coverage on that area of my body because it had already sustained an injury. I was faced with a $16,000 hospital bill for something that was not unlike what I underwent in the last couple of days in Italy. Needless to say, when the bills started pouring in within a month of surgery, I got progressively more depressed. Here I was, trying to get my arm back to health, and I had to deal with how to foot that kind of bill, which felt enormous for a 26-year old woman who was out of work at the time. That financial legacy lingered on long after the wounds were healed.

Fast forward to now. I can concentrate on my leg without worrying so much about my bank account. This is a real relief.

When the Italian hospital staff was asking me about life as an American, they were implying that everything seems better across the ocean. But I pointed out that the very action of their care, which was free for me, is one of the great differences between there and here. Then they smiled. "E' vero" (That's true).

Too Slow in the Slow Country

Italy is famous for being the country that invented Slow Food.

Foreigners consider it a wonderful destination because life seems to slow down while you visit or live here. (I can attest to this, especially when living here during the summer. Almost everything slows down or comes to a standstill in the cities.)

I enjoy this to some degree, depending on where I am (beach) and what I need to get done (not anything important like getting official certification of any kind).

But right now, I am talking about the slow one being me.

I can barely walk.

I sprained my ankle two weeks ago while dancing to Cindy Lauper on the banks of Venice's Giudecca during the famed Redentore celebration. Everything was grand until my left foot came down hard on an uneven surface: where the grassy plot met the sidewalk. Bang. Rip. My achilles tendon has been killing me ever since.

I am getting frustrated after hobbling along for 15 days.

I have had to give up attending an outdoor concert among other fun activities.

I have a hard time walking my dog.

Driving can be painful. At least I have a moped and don't need to be using my feet for any clutch action on it!

Life has become INCREDIBLY slow.

I am even slow for Italian standards.

For now, the swelling has gone down. The bruised areas are healing. I am getting physical therapy. I am waiting. I am trying to enjoy summer with my feet up. But honestly, at this point, I'd rather have them down and ready to scale mountains or at least take a leisurely stroll with my pooch.

(Monte Rosa, please give me good weather at the end of August when I can finally climb your summits! I regret having to postpone my original trekking dates which were dedicated to you next week.)

I guess I'll have another glass of chilled white wine while I soak my ankle in the essence of lavender flowers, one of the many herbal therapies I am currently using to bring my tendon back to an active life.

Salute! Cheers/To my health!