An Excavation and A Good Report

Today, eleven days after my heel surgery, I had an appointment scheduled for follow-up.  I was more than excited, as this was my first out-of-the-house outing since then.  Who'd a thought a visit to the doc could get me so honkered up, but there you have it.

Son/chauffeur/state cop-to-be Caleb helped me exit the house carefully, riding down the three steps backwards on the knee scooter.  In hindsight, what were we thinking?  Just because it could be done, doesn't mean it should be.  My middle name is NOT Wallenda.

Anyway I made it into the car in one piece, and Caleb got us to the hospital in a timely manner.  And, we used our new handy dandy temporary handicap car tag while parking right by the front door.  Of course that was after we looped through the entire parking lot to its far end - Caleb needed to first get a look at an awesome jeep with big rugged tires that he had spotted parked way back there.  In the color he wants.

I was quickly called back by the nurse, and I scootered myself right into the procedure room and parked next to the stretcher.

It was then that THE EXCAVATION began.  Fear not, I won't be showing any of the gory details.  You can keep on reading.

However,  there were layers and layers of stuff packed in under the outer ace bandages, including a hard splint up the back of my leg and around my foot and ankle.  It took a while to get down to the bottom of things.

I'm happy to report that there were no maggots or other nasty things residing down in there.  No dead skin.  Nothing gross.  Just one big hairy leg.  And a nicely healing incision.

After all the wrappings were lifted away, one kind nurse washed most of the orange pre-surgery disinfectant away.

I had to laugh when I saw again the surgeon's pre-surgery notation on that foot.  The nurse informed me that this little tattoo will be with me for quite a while.  That's OK;  I kinda like the message.

Stitches were removed, which was frankly a bit uncomfortable.  Sterile strips were applied, and then came the boot.

If I thought my other immobilization boot was huge, (you can read about that one in my February "Not A Happy Camper" post), this one makes that old one look like the kid sister.

It not only immobilizes my ankle and foot, but it also keeps my foot at a certain angle, allowing the proper tension on my achilles tendon so that it can heal properly without too much strain.

The orthotics guy told me to file the extensive boot papers and directions in the safe at home with all of our other major appliance papers.

This boot comes with several heel wedges.  Right now I am wearing the largest one.  They will decrease the size of the wedge as the tendon can tolerate more stretch.

Yes, my toes are buried down in there somewhere, too.  I wonder if there is a discount for a five toe pedicure?

After receiving a good report, detailed directions on weight bearing restrictions, and a physical therapy plan, we headed for home.

Do you recall that part up above where I talked about backing out of the house on the knee scooter?  Guess what, it doesn't work in reverse.

Oops!