6 Months Post Peroneal Tendon Surgery
Let’s just get right out there and say it. I am not at all where I thought I would be 6 months post peroneal tendon surgery. I went into my 6 month post-op appointment yesterday feeling like I was meeting with a professor to check in on a project I hadn’t started.
But I left feeling pretty good about where I’m at.
My calves are finally the same size. (Which means my crops don’t creep up to my knee anymore– hallelujah!) The (albeit exceedingly nice) fellow showed a great deal of enthusiasm for my stellar hopping ability and single leg heel raise strength.
I was feeling great.
My leg strength had been coming back, which also means nearly all of pants actually fit again instead of hanging off my legs like sacks. Its amazing how looking like what you’re used to makes you feel like yourself again.
I was feeling strong. Ready. I was slowly creeping up in how much weight I could lift, my single-leg squats were rapidly improving, and I was throwing in new things at least once a week. Running felt like it was right around the corner.
And then I woke up 65 years older.
Out of nowhere I woke up early one morning with a completely numb left leg. In my half-asleep state I decided it was asleep and just need a little extra blood flow. The more I tried to get the feeling back, the more I realized something else was clearly wrong. After panicking, ruling out a blood clot, and being wide awake, I realized it was sciatica.
Two weeks later and I’m still fighting with it. I finally have a better sense of what makes it better and what angers it to the point where it sends angry stinging bees all the way down my leg into my foot. Short of anger management for pissed off nerves, I’ve tried just about everything.
After months of progress and feeling like I’m finally coming back into myself and a healed body, the sciatica has been particularly devastating. I can’t lift at all, even benching seems to irritate it. Running on the Alter-G or outside like I dreamed of is out of the question until this is fully resolved. Just staying comfortable and getting my work done day to day has been a huge challenge.
But there is good news.
I can swim. Swimming seems to be the one thing that reliably soothes my sciatica and my mind. My ankle is killing it in the water – I can kick a fair bit and flip turns are no problem. Now if I could just get my skin to stop peeling off like a molting snake from the chlorine…
In Case You Missed It:
I thought I could still play basketball
One Month Later
Two
Three
Four
Five
Six
Eight
Nine
10 months and surgery
11 Months + Surgery
What I learned from a year of being injured
Three months post peroneal tendon surgery
Four months post peroneal tendon surgery
