Today was my first day of physical therapy. After surgery, my mom and my aunt couldn’t wait to tell me how painful it was going to be, but based on today, I think it’ll be just fine. They also complained that it was such a chore when they had to go through it, but I don’t view it that way. Last year, I enjoyed my sessions because I was getting some improvement and some of my leisure activities back. This year, I’m even more thrilled to be going to therapy; if everything goes as planned, I should be a lot better than I was before surgery. I’m excited to start training my body again, and I’m looking forward to signing up for some cycling events this year.

My physical therapy plan is a little unusual in that I’ll be going for two weeks to work directly with someone, then I’ll be doing four weeks by myself at home until the boot comes off. I only get 30 visits per year, so this way I can maximize them and have the majority of my sessions when I can do more. Until I lose the boot, there’s not much sense wasting the visits on stretching and range of motion that I can do at home. By the end of March, I’ll be back there doing more aggressive rehab; it’ll certainly be more worthwhile when I can put my full weight on it.

I’m going to the same physical therapy clinic that I went to last year. I never even considered going anywhere else; they did an amazing job before, plus I like that they know my case. They know where I was a year ago and where I am now. Everyone is really nice there and I feel comfortable being myself, which is something I definitely struggle with since I have an introverted personality. The therapist I’ll be working with knows my passion for cycling from last year’s sessions, plus he lives on my bike route, so we see each other on occasion while I’m out riding, so I know for sure he knows how important cycling is to me. He recommended my surgeon to me; I’m so grateful to be able to work with someone who really seems to care about his patients. Apparently he’ll even attend doctor’s appointments for orthopedic cases as a way to improve continuity of care so that he can speak with the doctor more easily. I’m told it’s a new service they started offering and that it has a really positive response from other patients. However, unless I have an unusual problem or things start going poorly, I would feel bad putting any extra work on his schedule. I can see where it might be a good idea for some people, but as long as everything is going smoothly, I don’t think it’s a necessity for myself.

So what happened on my first day? Nothing too eventful, honestly. I had my initial evaluation and then we started right in with some exercises. I warmed up my foot and ankle in a hot whirlpool, and then my therapist started working on releasing some of the scar tissue so that the area around my incisions won’t be all thick on the sides. After that, I just did some gentle stretching and range of motion exercises before calling it a day. The only pain I had was when my therapist was rubbing the scar tissue and he got to the place where the screws in my heel are located. It was only a temporary pain, and he eased off a little when I told him it was sore. Some pain is expected, of course, but now that seven hours has passed, I have zero pain. Something that was amusing to me was the fact that my therapist was all excited to see that I had the Even Up on my normal shoe. He said he’s never seen anyone with a walking boot come in with one of those before and that it was clever because it keeps the body more in balance. He asked where I got it from and I told him the doctor’s office gave it to me. I guess it’s not really a common device, so I’m even more impressed with my surgeon than before.

I’m hoping the next few weeks go well. I probably won’t have much to report on until I go back to work, but I’ll keep y’all posted if anything changes!