Week Twelve (Part 2): “I lost my marbles…”

(12 weeks post break / 11 weeks post ORIF)

Whatever good luck that a Unicorn Physical Therapist could provide, needed to kick in pretty fast. I would be flying to Denver in 4 days, and to say that I was absolutely terrified to my core would be an understatement.

Two feet, firmly planted, on the cold and hard ground.

At this point, even though the discomfort in my ankle joint was not as bad as anticipated, I felt about as strong as a wet noodle. Each morning, as I would take my first steps out of bed, my ankle was extremely stiff, and fairly unsteady. As the day progressed, the steps became steadier, but the discomfort remained constant. Near the end of the day, the discomfort would cross over to the threshold of pain (but nothing that some ibuprofen, ice, and elevation couldn’t control). The sole of my foot seemed to have the worst of it. I hadn’t realized how many muscles there were in your feet, until I found out the hard way that I had lost just about every single one of them. Then there was some swelling, constant throbbing, and irritation and flaking from all the dead skin. But I would still like to re-iterate, that none of this was too bad, especially considering that I had only begun Full Weight Bearing a couple of days ago. Let’s call this my ‘Unicorn’ phase. The phase in my recovery where I felt overly optimistic, and unfoundedly invincible.

This phase wouldn’t last too long, I promise.

Over the next couple of days in physical therapy and at home- I continued working on my range of motion, and pain relief (via elevation and ice). I did this several times a day. I traced the ABC’s with my foot, I stretched my ankle (and comfort level) as far as I could, and then I rested/iced and worked up the strength to do it all over again in another couple of hours.

Ice, Ibuprofen, and a sock that
greets you with a smile.

The PTs gave me some interesting exercises to imitate new ways to improve my range of motion, mobility, and flexibility. They manually massaged my ankle joint, and forced it to bend a little bit more, and then a little bit more, and so on… They gave me some ideas for things that I could do at home. I was pretty exhausted, and felt like I was walking a tightrope balanced between my sanity and my patience. And then, in my last visit before my flight, they gave me the most ironic and amusing exercise of all. 

My PT went to the back room of the clinic and came back with large white bowl, and a jar full of marbles. He poured the marbles out of the jar, and told me to put them into the bowl, one at a time, using my feet. I wasn’t even sure that I could have done something requiring this much dexterity BEFORE my injury, let alone with my weak and shaky post-op, swollen ankle.

Oh the sweet and slippery irony...

“Try not to lose your marbles” he said, as he walked away, leaving me amidst the irony and marbles.

Let’s just say that they are probably still looking for some marbles underneath their exercise equipment to this day…