18th day post op: It's been awhile since I last updated my journal due to the constant pain I am experiencing after I had my femurs done. I think because my body was substantially weakened after my tib/fib procedure (February 15, 2018), I experience more pain when I underwent another surgery (March 15, 2018) almost immediately right after. PLEASE DO NOT DO WHAT I DID. Only do one surgery at a time, completely recovery, and then do another one. I can't afford to do that. I own and run a company. I'm at the peak of my career. I have to take major losses every day that I don't work. Therefore, I cannot afford anymore downtime. If you're working and have to take a break or quit your job, do it. It's not that bad except that you might not have enough money to carry on with life thereafter. My point is you should do this surgery as soon as possible. You don't know where you'll end up in life and you might be in a position where money is no longer an issue but you just can't set aside 4-6 months to do this surgery.
In addition to financial losses, I have staffing problem at my company the last couple of weeks. My manager decided to quit and only gave me two weeks to find a replacement. He's a very intelligent employee so it's going to be tough to find someone like him in such a short period of time. My other manager will be taking her maternity leave soon so I have to hire someone to do her work while she's gone. I've been reviewing resumes and interviewing candidates for these two positions. To make matters worse, I got hit with 3 HOA bills: 2016, 2017, and 2018 for a total of almost $20,000.00. I own a new building where my company is operating in and never got the bill in 2016 or 2017. All of the sudden, they demanded that pay all 3 years together. I did pay but realized that they inflated many charges and some of the charges are don't even exist. I proposed that all owners meet to resolve all issues together. My birthday was last week so I'm 34 now and it wasn't a good birthday as you can see. It's very difficult for me to handle these issues due to the constant pain I'm experiencing. I'm in my third week of my femur procedure but Norco doesn't work that good anymore. I still experience pain with pain meds. The pain level with pain meds is still around 3-4 whereas it was 0-1 before the femur procedure.
I feel a little better today and the nerve pain on the right side of my right thigh is not so bad with pain meds. I resumed lengthening my tib/fib a couple of days ago and I went down to 3x a day on my femurs. Nighttime is the worst and especially when I exercise (PT) during the day. I can only sleep 1-2 hours at night and 1-2 hours during the day due to the constant severe pain in my thighs. My mom massages my feet for hours during the day and at night to help with the pain. It helps a little. My mom is getting tired doing it so my female friend is taking over. I think foot massage is very helpful with pain and especially when you're waiting for the pain meds to kick in.
My appetite is somewhat okay now but not as good as before when I had my tib/fib procedure done. I have gained about 1 inch in my tib/fib and .5 inch in my femurs. My legs look so long now. I think part of it is because my legs got so skinny so they give the impression that they are much longer than they really are. I'm happy to see my legs getting longer. I don't feel the tightness in my tib/fib and calf muscles yet. I feel a lot of tightness in my thighs and I think it's the effect of the surgery as I've only lengthened less than .5 inch in that region. I'm really worried that they will get tight soon and since I'm lengthening both regions at the same time, my lengthening will be substantially limited. However, at least my proportion will be better compared to if I only lengthen 1 region. The other concern I have is the lack of bone growth. I didn't have much bone growth based on my last x-ray. I stopped taking Ibuprofen (main culprit) about 3 weeks ago and have been taking Vitamin D and Calcium religiously. I am hoping to see some bone growth at the next post op with Dr. M. I have already booked my flight and will be flying back home after the post-op in the same day.
Tips:
1. Try not to move your legs so much unless you need to. It's okay to exercise but when you're done, rest and get some sleep so the muscles can heal.
2. If you can pee in the urinal, do so to limit the amount of times you have to get in and out of bed.
3. Get foot massages but only at the bottom of your feet. My calves are still sore from the tib/fib surgery.
4. Don't wait for your pain to get to so high before doing something about it. Rectify it right away because it will take longer to bring down your pain when it's at 8 or 9.
5. If you can only sleep a couple of hours at night, get some sleep during the day.
Any questions, please feel free to ask me.
Author
Topic: Bilateral Internal Tib/Fib and Bilateral Internal Femurs with Dr. Mahboubian. (Read 16826 times)