Day Ten: Humility, and why it's good to have a brother who is an athletic coach

 From an intellectual, left-brained perspective, I was and am fully cognizant of the road ahead of me, and prepared to walk it. From emotional perspective, reality kicked me in the gut.

Friday was my first physical therapy appointment. I walked in with my brace and my crutches, and was encouraged and energized by the room full of equipment. 

Let's go.

I lay on the table while Matt, my PT guy, manipulated my leg. First thing was to measure my range of motion.

"One week out, we want to see knee flexion at 90 degrees. And when you extend your leg straight we want a bend of less than 10 degrees. The extension is the thing we really want to focus on first, but you're going to be working on both. Your bend is at about 85 degrees, and your extension is at around 11 or 12. So you're in good shape. You're doing well."

The numbers are everything to me. I thought to myself, dude, you have NO idea how task-oriented I am. There's no way I'm walking out of here without hitting those targets. 

I was lying on my back with my left knee bent. I scooted my heel back towards my butt in small increments. 

Scoot scoot. Rest for 10 seconds. Scoot scoot. Rest for 10 seconds. Scoot scoot.

"Where is it now?"

He measured again. "Ninety degrees. Nice job."

Then he put a bolster under my Achilles heel so that my leg was extended as much as possible. I tried to focus on relaxing the muscles to let gravity work to pull the back of the knee down. It was extremely difficult and uncomfortable. I couldn't hold the position for more than a couple of minutes at a time.

"You're going to need to do this multiple times a day, trying to hold it for longer and longer as you can tolerate it." 

We did that for a while.

"Where's the extension now?" I asked.

He measured again. "Nine degrees. Excellent."

I mentally patted myself on the back.

We worked on a few other things. He unlocked my brace so that the knee would bend and I could start trying to use a more normal gait, bringing my left leg up to take a step and then landing with a proper heel-to-toe.

They use a digital system that sends exercises to an app, so he loaded up my account with exercises for the week. The app is great - it tracks your activity and includes video so you can follow along and imitate the movements.

I left feeling good. 

The next day, I did a PT session on my own, and I broke down and cried.

It was so hard. It was so humbling. I can barely lift my leg up from a lying-down position. I can't contract my quad muscle. There's one exercise that involves lying face-down on the floor and lifting the leg up, and it took all of my concentration to be able to lift it a tiny bit.

The dreaded leg extension

I felt like a baby learning to walk. 

I had a vision of the next 6 months. Limping along. Constantly being uncomfortable. Not being able to do anything. Feeling weak and puny.

It reduced me to tears.

Greg came over to help me move my ice machine down the stairs from my bedroom - basically, a little cooler filled with freezing cold water that flows through tubes into a pad that I can wrap around my leg. It's on a timer that I can set, so I ice the knee for 10-15 minutes every hour. It is my new favorite thing that I own. But I use crutches to get up and down the stairs, and I can't use the crutches and carry the ice machine at the same time. And if I can't get it downstairs, I'm stuck in my room all day, which is a drag.

When he came in, I lamented that I felt awful and weak and helpless. I hate that my muscles won't do what I tell them to do. I hate that I have to ask people to come help me with basic tasks.

He gave me a hug and assured me that I would get stronger and more self-sufficient. He said that it was ok to ask for help, and that I have many people in my life who love me and are happy to help me.

Later that day, I called my brother Josh. Josh had this same surgery about eight years ago, so he's a good resource and sounding board. He is also a high school lacrosse coach, so he's good at motivational pep talks. 

We talked about the rehab timeline and the experience he had. He said that full recovery would take many months. But I can't focus on the end goal or how long it will take me to get there. 

I have to take it one workout and one day at a time. Don't worry about increasing your knee flexion by 30 degrees. Try to improve by one degree. And then one degree the next day. It feels insignificant but it adds up. After a month, you've improved by 30 degrees. Treat the PT like any of the other exercise programs I've done. Do what's on the calendar for today, and then don't worry about it. Tomorrow, do the same thing. By the end of the program, you'll see the results.

I know this. Of course I know this. I've used those same principles to motivate other people. When one of the kids is overwhelmed by the fact that they're supposed to have read eight chapters of the book but are only on chapter two, I tell them, "just read one chapter. You can do one chapter. And when that's done, you can focus on the next chapter." 

But I needed to hear it from someone else, because I wasn't listening to myself. 

"Will you coach me through this?" I asked. "Could you send me a text or some kind of meme or whatever to help me stay motivated and on the ball? That's never really been my thing, but I think I need it."

"Absolutely," he said.

After we hung up, I ordered a whiteboard to put up in my workout room. I can track each day's workouts and write motivational quotes. 

I told Greg about this and he told me I was a nerd. 

"You like that I'm nerdy," I responded, laughing.

"I totally do," he smiled. 

On Sunday morning, Josh sent me an audio of clips of different motivational speeches by coaches. I did my PT sessions on Sunday, and felt good about them.

I love my brother.

I woke up this morning and did another session. I lifted some weights for shoulders and arms, and then got on the Peloton and did 5 minutes of partial revolutions back and forth (I can't yet do a full revolution in either direction). I use my right leg to push the pedals in each direction, getting as far as I can and then holding it for 10 seconds before going back the other way. I do this at least twice a day, and try to move a little further each time.

Giant nerd alert

I took the ice machine downstairs by myself and started work (I'm working from home after taking last week off). The whiteboard will arrive later today. I've got my set of colored dry-erase markers ready. 

Keep the motivational quotes and memes coming my way. I am in full dork mode and I am here for them.