If you’ve ever needed physical therapy, you may have made this same observation. It seems there are a disproportionate number of athletic young women that work as physical therapists. There isn’t anything wrong with that other than it makes the whole experience weirder for a middle aged guy like me.
I have come a long way in two and a half weeks
Physical therapy is a necessary but unpleasant part of the recovery process after TKR. It is every bit as important as the surgery itself. The therapist helps to restore the proper motion of the body part, the knee in my case, and strengthen the muscles necessary to normalize the use the of that limb or other part. Therapists must do some things that, in some cases, can be quite painful in order to accomplish this end. So when one is greeted with, “Hi. My name is Alicia and I am here to torture you.” Smile. Giggle. It is all a little surreal.
Now I am not positive that is exactly what Alicia said. But I know that is what she meant. That first session of therapy is somewhat difficult to accurately recall and evaluate, because my mind was still pretty saturated with opiate painkillers. But this week has been clear because I quit the opiates this past weekend.
My third session was today. The main focus at this point is restoring the degree that my knee can bend. Apparently I am doing pretty well. The surgeon stated that the goal at this point is about a 90 degree bend. Mine has 103 degrees of flexion at this point. But this came at a price. It is sort of a “How much can you physically take” proposition. So Alicia has been taking my leg and bending it, pushing me to the limits of my pain tolerance, which is normally quite high. But that may work to my disadvantage in this case, because what you can take is what is afflicted.
I remember a similar experience when I was rehabbing my ACL reconstruction a decade and a half ago. I had another young female therapist. She bent my leg until I grasped the sides of the table with all my might, while sweating profusely, clenching my teeth, and trying to fight back wailing out in pain. This gal, however, mocked me, describing how well the twelve year old she worked on that morning took the same treatment. I dare not complain lest I lose all sense of my manhood.
Alicia is not so brazenly cruel. She is actually quite pleasant about it all. Though she is very strong and inflicts an amazing amount of pain without relenting. She asks frequently, “How are you doing?” What is different is that she makes me feel kind of guilty about complaining. I am not sure whether she actually cares about how I am doing or if that is strategy to make me think she does while she inflicts pain. To make it worse, Vicki was sitting beside the torture table, er, I mean, therapy table. And I did not want to embarrass myself in front of her.
Maybe the best part of what is happening, in spite of the pain, is that I am improving. My mind is now clear enough to consider it all. Getting off the opiates is important. They do a great job of alleviating pain. But I did not like how they made me feel emotionally and mentally. I am now beginning to sense that I can be productive in spite of my current physical limitations. I can have normal conversations with people. My emotions are under control. These are important advances.
Knees and other stuff 