Hi Movie,
It appears to me that you're well on your way. It's showtime now. Basically, at this stage of CLL, the Rocky music comes on in the background and you have to start your montage for the next few months. Here are stretches that you want to ensure you are during regularly. Your PT will likely teach you these. You may not be fully capable of doing these yet due to some pain, inflammation, currently inflexibility. That is okay. Do the best you can and be careful. You can always do modified versions of these until your body is ready. Another thing I want to mention is that one of the many things I learned during CLL is that there is no magic stretch or magic PT move to help you succeed through this. Bottom line is that you have to stretch and lengthen the hamstrings, hip-flexors, and quadriceps muscles the best you can. Please You Tube stretches for these 3 muscle groups so you can choose effectively build a stretching and rehab routine for each. I would advise to add the world "tight" and/or "lengthen" to the front of the words hip, quadriceps and hamstring and then add the word stretch. The stretches below were the most effective stretches for me during the CLL process.
Here is another point of emphasis. You're going encounter 3 major challenges, particularly.
1: Tight quads will cause your pelvis to tilt forward, your glutes and stomach will want to stick out due to the change in vertebrae positioning as a result of the pelvis tilting. You can best prevent this by stretching your quads, strengthening your lower abs and glutes the best you can. Be sure to start now and work hard at this.
2. Your legs are going to want to bend at the knees hence you will start to struggle to keep your leg straight and you might struggle to stand 100% straight up and down. This is due to tighter hamstrings. Stretch your hamstrings well and also practice keeping your legs straight at the knees. You want to prevent the knee bending leg the best you can. Having said this, its possible that you may finish your lengthening phase and still have a few degrees of bend. Eventually, once lengthening stops, with continued PT everything relaxes and returns to a more normalized state.
3. You're going to notice as you lengthen, that its going to be more difficult to stand with your legs together. This is due to tight hip flexors, quads, and hamstrings. Keep stretching and this will eventually improve over time.
During distraction, it's about keeping tightness manageable. Once you stop the lengthening process, you will find that over the next several weeks, pelvic tilt and the knee bending as well as other tightness begin to get better dramatically.
30 Seconds x 2 Sets for each stretch. I did these stretches 3 times a day either right before or right after the I performed lengthening sessions.
Quads:
Hip Flexors
Hamstrings
Other tips:
- Set a timer for every 25 minutes to stand up for a few minutes. Do not lay down or sit down for long periods of the day. Sitting down shortens our hip flexors. You want to stay loose and keep those hip flexors stretched out as much as possible.
- Immediately begin to strengthen your glutes and your lower abs as soon as you are capable. Your Glutes took a beating during surgery and you will want to regain strength in this area as soon possible so that these muscles again, take hold of your pelvis.
- As soon as you're safely able to (for me it was about 2-3 weeks), take walks around your place or any other safe area. Do this for a good 5-10 minutes or so. I tried do take short walks with my walker or crutches, once an hour.
I'll continue to chime in. Let me know if you have additional questions.
All the Best,
IFS
Author
Topic: Movie - Femurs with Dr. Mahboubian 9/01/2019 (Read 81170 times)