Total Ankle Replacement 1 Year/6 Month Update – Good News And Bad News

Yesterday I made the trek into DC to see my surgeon for my 1 year (left ankle) and 6 month (right ankle) check up.  My original appointment wasn't for another month, but considering the pain I've been in, and the lack of progress, they wanted to see me earlier.

If you've been following along with my progress, then you know that I've plateaued in the past few months.  Since March, I haven't been able to do more than 10 minutes on the treadmill without being in a ton of pain.  Seems like 10-15 minutes on my feet is the absolute most I can do, and by then I'm hurting like a mofo.

 

 

The Good News

My ROM (range of motion) is great.  And looking at some newly taken x-rays, it seems like the implants are healing up nicely.  Everything concerning the ankle joint is perfect.  My surgeon was very happy with his work :)

I explained to my doc that I still can't be on my feet for more than 10 minutes without being in pain and asked why that would be.  And then came the bad news...

The Bad News (with a little Good News (sorta) sprinkled in)

The bones in my feet are shit!  Because of my condition (SED—aka: shitty bone disease) I have severe arthritis in my feet.  I'm looking at future surgery on fusing a few of these bones in order to help with the pain.  When I heard the word “fusion” I freaked out.  At first I thought he was talking about fusing my new cyborg ankles that I just busted my ass for a year to get to work right.  But he assured me that it's not my ankles he's talking about, but my feet.  Apparently ankles and feet are separate things...duh! :P  Doc says that fusing the bones in my feet won't affect my ROM because any ROM that I would have had in these bones is already gone.  I asked if my walking would be affected and he said that it would probably be better since I won't be in pain.

The circled pen marks are the spots where he'd do the fusions.

Now, he won't really get into the knitty gritty of the surgery just yet.  He wants to see me back in 6 months for my one year anniversary on ankle #2.  If I'm still having pain at time, then I'm thinking this foot-bone-fusing discussion will happen then.

So I'm looking at another surgery in the near future, but it should help with my pain...that's the sprinkle of good news just in case you missed it :)

What do I do now for my feet pain?

He's hoping that my new orthotics will help relieve some of my pain.  Since I've only had them a week, it's still too early to tell.  My husband asked how long it would take to see some improvement with the orthotics and Doc said for a “normal” person it usually takes about six weeks...but for me he thinks I'm looking at a couple of months.  Either way, this is a longer time frame than Ryan (the orthotics fitting dude) gave me.  Oh well.  Fingers crossed!  Anyone else have orthotics?  If they've helped, how long did it take for them to start helping?

Doc is also prescribing some compound pain cream to rub on my feet twice a day.  I have some pain cream that I use on my neck (to read about my neck problems click here) and this sounds like a similar cream.  The cream I have helps with my neck, so hopefully this new one will help with my feet.

I'm also supposed to start actually taking my Celebrex twice a day as it's prescribed.  On the bottle, it says to take one pill once in the morning and once at night.  Well, I try to take as little medicine as possible so I usually only take it at night.  I guess now I'll change it to twice a day and just suck it up!

Figuring it couldn't hurt to ask, I asked if cortisone injections would help at all with the foot pain.  Doc basically laughed out loud.  Apparently my bones are so shitty that they'd react to cortisone with a "bitch please!"  Oh joy!

At least I have some answers now as to why I haven't been getting any better.  It's always worse when you don't know what's wrong.  Don't you think?

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To read about my full ankle replacement journey, please click on the Total Ankle Replacement tab.  

I'm happy to answer any questions that you may have.  Please comment below, or email me privately at:  thecyborgmom@gmail.com

My New Custom Orthotics...The Jury Is Out

I got fitted for my custom orthotics a few weeks ago (you can read about my fitting here) and was finally able to pick them up this week.  Figured I'd get pictures before they get all gross and stinky.

Here they are with my Easy Spirit sneakers in a size 6, which is a half size bigger than I normally wear.  They easily go in and come out.

The top of the orthotic (the black part) feels soft.  The part where the toes are is very flexible.  The rest is pretty rigid.

This is the bottom...the white part is the heel.  

They feel kind of weird, but not bad...just different.  I have to give them some time before I come to a decision about them.  The only other pair of shoes that I've tried them with is my Sketchers sneakers, which are my usual size, a 5.5.  They fit inside them okay, but my feet fit really shallow.

The good news is that "right" and "left" are printed on the bottom, along with my name...so I feel a little bit like a kindergartener :)

I go to see my ankle surgeon this Friday for a post-op check up and to see what's going on with my lack of progress.  I'll do an update post next week to keep everyone informed!