So What's Up?

It's been a while so I thought I'd bring you up to speed on what's been happening lately.

First, on the medical side, the last trip to the pain management docs yielded four things. I can keep weaning off the suboxone, I can start weaning off the lyrica, I can stop taking the tramadol, and apparently I have completely exhausted all their capabilities.

The suboxone and lyrica are both types of pain meds that they want me off of and I want off of. Besides, they were none too effective anyway. The tramadol is another pain med given to em for dealing with the pain created by physical therapy. It wasn't working at all.

After all this I told them my feet were in some level of pain all the time. The essentially told me that's just too damn bad because they had nothing else to offer me. You would think since they are pain specialists and there are an absurd number of medications out there that they would be able to figure out something to help me with my pain. Apparently not. I'm on my own from here on out.

On the physical therapy side of things, there have been a few changes of late.

The balancing exercise I told you about where I stand on a trampoline with my feet in various positions has been modified. They now through a ball to me while I stand on the trampoline. Talk about some hard work! My feet and knees feel like Jell-O after that one.

My time on the elliptical machine and the total gym have both been increased. I expect the elliptical will continue to be increased much as the treadmill was. That thing is quite the workout and I'm rather enjoying it even though sometimes it feels like I'm gonna fall off the thing.

My weights and/or reps keep getting bumped up on my platform and leg extension machine exercises. The platform work is cool, but I could not hate that machine any more if I tried. It is a booger to get in and out of, it is a booger to setup and use, and by the time I am done on it something about it makes my feet hurt so much I can barely stand up.

Finally, I think, they have modified my stationary bike. Until today I've been using a bike they had removed the seat from and I operated it by sitting in a chair behind it. Today they put me on one with a seat to increase my aerobic activity and to work my back and my balance a little more. That's all well and good except that the seat on that thing could not be any more uncomfortable if it were made of a block of old hickory. I swear my butt must be bruised like I just took a good old fashioned beating!

On the work front, I gave them an update on my situation and they could not be any more supportive. I am so very lucky in that regard. They continue to tell me to take all the time I need and even though they'd love to see me back, they would rather I do what I gotta do and take care of myself first. How great is that?

As for my walking, I am now using the straight cane almost exclusively. I think we've used the wheelchair once and the walker twice in the past week, and neither ever get used at home except when I use the walker in the middle of the night and in the morning to steady myself a bit when I first get out of bed.

That is not to say there are no consequences for all the walking. I need to walk as much as I can, but it is causing all kinds of extreme swelling from the tip of my toes all the way through my ankle. I also have a wide variety of aches and pains to go with the swelling, the worst being in the balls of my feet and in my ankles as everything gets used to being used again. And now that I'm getting off the lyrica, I should have a nice variety of pains come in as nerves reawaken and I have nothing to dull the effect.

It never ceases to amaze me that for the amount of damage that was done to my heels and the extensive surgery that was done to repair them, I have almost no pain in my heels. I do have one little spot on one heel and I'm still not used to walking on hard surfaces without shoes so that hurts them a good bit, but other than that, it's the rest of my feet and ankles that are causing me all the pain and discomfort. Weird.

That's all I can think of for now so I'll close with this little reminder....

Save the handicapped stalls for handicapped folks if at all possible. They don't have any other options and they often have other needs than just the basic business.

I know. That was kinda weird too, but trust me. It's important!