First Post-Op Appointment after Second Surgery

Went in today for my first post-op appointment after the second surgery (which was 6 days ago, last Tuesday). Things continue to progress well, although the x-rays showed that there are still some tiny, tiny bone fragments scattered through the tissue under my fibula.

What had the most impact on me, however, was how my surgeon described my injury. He has used the words "devastating injury" when describing it all to my parents, but he's never been quite that emphatic when talking with me. Today, when I was asking questions about the blood flow out of my ankle, he got right to the point.

He said something to the effect of: look, you came close to ripping your foot completely off. If you weren't young and healthy, you might have lost the foot, all the tissue there is extremely damaged....

gulp.

Oh.

I mean, I knew I had really done a number on my ankle. It can never be good to see bone sticking through your skin. And I knew I really sorta shattered the end of my fibula, which is why I've got the plate and all the screws.

But when your surgeon paints the picture that your foot was half off, that's something else entirely.

gulp.

Anyway, moving on, things seem to be progressing fine. As you can see below, swelling is way down, incisions seem to be healing well, so now we're just waiting for the bones to heal.


My foot is finally recognizable as my long and bony foot. No longer a balloon stuck on the end of my leg.


For the second surgery, the new incision was actually made right through the old incision. Looks so different without all the swelling!


The second surgery didn't include any work on the inside of my ankle. It's hard to tell from this photo, but the incision here from the first surgery is now practically smooth with the surface of my skin. I was afraid I was going to have a thick ropy scar, but that doesn't look to be the case.

The second surgery did confirm that the large chunk of bone visible in the CT scan, near the end of my fibula, was in fact the chunk that was missing from the end of my tibia.

Look at your own ankle and imagine this: a piece of bone, about 2/3 the size of a dice cube, was broken off from the back of your inside ankle bone (the rear of the tibia) and driven around and across the front of the ankle until it came to rest adjacent to the front of your outside ankle bone (the front of the fibula). Crazy huh?

But the piece was pretty badly mangled, and the cartilage left on it was badly damaged, so my surgeon elected to discard it rather than try to put it back in place because of all the risks that would incur.


Look Ma, two ankles! This is the first time I've seen both ankles in two and half weeks. With both legs down, so that you had something to compare it to, it was amazing to watch my right foot and ankle swell and change color as the blood drained into it and didn't get pumped back out. You can see this in the photo above, but it doesn't quite do it justice.  It was also amazing to be able to watch my foot and ankle literally drain, once I elevated the foot.  More on this in another post soon.


My poor calve muscles are so atrophied. (And I'm told I haven't seen anything yet. Ugh.) But at least the gashes on my shin are healing up well.

So that's all for now.  I'm back to laying back with my feet above the level of my heart.  I've heard that PT is hell, but right now I can't wait.  All this laying around helpless is killing me!