Feeling so discouraged....

[Lynn49]

It's been almost a year since my fall, taking the top off my fibula and making "crushed eggshells" on the outside of my leg. A year! I walk with a cane, so I still can't walk like a normal person. I had 2 screws removed before Christmas because they were encroaching into the area between my tibia and my knee. ( soft tissue), which relieved that pain. Now, that same pain is on the inside back of my knee! How can that be possible, if that's where the screw heads are?! I feel the plate and remaining 7 screws with almost every step
I take...it's like someone is hitting that part of my keg with a baseball bat. Not agressively, just enough to feel a good "ouch!". I feel the cold in that plate when it's cold out...I could handle that, I really could, if the pain subsided. I can drive again, but if I can't walk without discomfort, what's the point?!

Sorry to vent, but at this moment, I've just had enough. I'll call my surgeon next week and she'll order an x-ray to determine what's going on, if anything's shifted.....and when and if I can have that hardware removed...I hear 18 months is the minimum....Christmas...I just don't want to feel like an invalid anymore!!

Thanks. I had to hammer that out.

[Natalka]

Oh, Lynn, so sorry... I had thought things were so much better!

[Durham Couponer]

I'm sorry you're still hurting, Lynn. Hopefully something can be done to help you before Christmas!

[Shwa Girl]

did you get physio OP?
did you get some exercises to do?

[Nina1]

So sorry to hear that. I really do hope it gets better for you soon. Vent away girl!

[Lynn49]

Thank you, Natalka, DurhamCouponer, ShwaGirl, Nina1....I thought I was getting better too; unfortunately things seem to be on the downslide right now. Yes, I've been in physio for the past year, trying to regain the strength in that leg and was progressing very well until this "discomfort" has been increasing. I know nothing like this is happening, but whenever I take a step with that right leg it feels as if the plate is pulling away somehow. Intellectually I know that nothing like that is happening, but the feeling is the same...like it's falling down...lol..pretty silly, really, but that's what it feels like. Even sitting in a recliner, to put that leg over the other...same thing...that pulling feeling. And the same hurting behind my knee as I had on the other side seems to signal that there's pressure once again between my tibia and my knee..into that soft tissue. Which will mean another surgery. Feeling this uncomfortable and in pain, trying to walk normally is impossible. With the travelling we've done this past month, I won't see my therapist until next week, so we'll go over what's going on and take it from there.
I'll have to make an appointment with my surgeon.

I'm not normally a complainer, but I've about had it with this injury, honestly. We're not getting any younger and still want to travel while we can; this isn't making it easy....

Thank you for putting up with my venting....{{{hugs}}}...Lynn

[frugal50]

it's part of the aging process, some folks handle pain better than others.

[coupon girl]

ahhh lynn vent away that's what we are here for -hope you get some answers

[Crochetlady]

Sorry to hear you are having problems again Lynn. Having pain is no fun.

[Lynn49]

it's part of the aging process, some folks handle pain better than others.

The aging process I can and have handled into my 65 years, but putting up with the inconvenient nuisance and discomfort of a metallic "intruder" in my leg is quite a different story, I'm afraid......Aging pains are my arthritis, rheumatism, my fibromyalgia that I've put up with for goodness knows how long (from my 20s) are pittances to what this pain is...

[Andit]

it's part of the aging process, some folks handle pain better than others.

I'm guessing you've never had the pleasure of dealing with complications from a broken bone to make such a remark?

As much as I would like some people to experience certain situations in order to better be able to empathize, I wouldn't wish these sorts of complications (& the pain that comes with them) on my worst enemy.

[annedougherty]

Yeah wow that comment was something else lol. I have a very major hip injury and I wish sometimes that some people had an inkling of what it has been like.
Comparatively a c section was nothing and I took zero pain meds after lol. THAT is how much pain I go through due to a bone injury.

[Andit]

Sorry to hear about the mini setback, Lynn (& it is minor! Just think, you can walk now, even if there is pain).

It took me 3 yrs to get back enough muscle tone to walk 'straight' (i.e., not like a drunken sailor) after the 2 yrs in casts. So don't be discouraged, there is still lots of time to get back to normal. In terms of the discomfort you're dealing with, I'm wondering whether tissue has formed around the screws & is pulling on them, so to speak. This sort of thing won't necessarily show up on an x-ray, tho. I've never dealt with plates or screws, but I have had tissue grow over hardware in my body in a matter of days (in my case plastic tubing that was supposed to drain an infection became, ahem, part of my body & hurt like the dickens when they pulled it out). To this day, if I have the urge to use salty language in polite company, I my curse of choice is 'Jackson Pratt' (the name of the tubing that caused the ouchie).

[Mia001]

i feel sorry for you Lynn, pain isn't a good thing to experience at all ((( big hugs to you )))

[Lynn49]

Thank you, Andi, Anne....yes, unless someone's experienced 'our' kind of pain, it's useless to even hope they understand it. Others, on the other hand, can at least sympathize with it, which is very kind of them.

Andi, you're right again, of course...I've come a long way, Baby! Perhaps I'm pushing it, thinking I should be walking normally again...but a year! Now there you are, 2 years in a cast, and another 3 to walk upright like (as my DD put it) a homo sapien.
I'll attempt to be a little more patient...your thoughts regarding tissue forming around the screws, thus my experiencing that "pulling feeling" may be just what's going on...I seemed to have healed so quickly. Muscle-tone, otoh, eludes me....

Take good care, you, too....I hope and pray all our pain is lessened and disappears in very short order!!