A Non-Event

Although it's been a good day, I have to say that the first out-patient physical therapy was a non-event. All the therapist did was take yet another extensive history and do an evaluation. Don't medical professionals ever share the information they collect about a patient? The therapist (who was very nice and whom I don't mean to disparage) kept asking me what my doctor had said about this and what the home physical therapist had said about that. I don't know! Really, I've had so much flung at me in the last 3 weeks, and much of that time I think I was in a drug-induced stupor, that I'm not entirely sure who said what or what they said. Can't these people fax or email basic information to one another?

Mostly, therefore, I sat or lay on an examining table trying to answer questions. After lying there for many minutes with both of my legs completely straight and stiff, she suddenly asked me to flex my operated knee so she could measure my range of motion. Now, when the home therapist measured, he did it at the end of my exercises when the muscle was as loose as it would get. Today the therapist measured it when it was stiff from being straight and immobile, so there was obviously a discrepancy. Last week at the end of my exercise routine, I had a range of motion of 110 degrees. Today, with a stiff leg, I initially had 92 degrees although she pushed my leg until it was at 100 degrees. I would like to have protested that the measurements were not done in similar manners and thus the results weren't really terribly comparable, but oh, well....they do what they want to do. Other than that, she asked me to walk up and down, and that's really all I did. I have a set of new exercises to do to prepare for tomorrow when, presumably, I will actually start doing something; however, after all her "no pain, no gain" warnings, I'm not sure I want to go back!

Stan and I have had an otherwise normal day. The morning was typical although Stan was out early working on the little walkway he's building in back of our house. After the therapy appointment, we stopped at the store to buy some salad fixings for dinner, and then came home. Stan has gone to the pool, I've been reading, but not napping! For the first time since my surgery, I'm not sleepy enough to take a nap--a little tired, but not really sleepy. Is this an anomalous event, or have I turned a corner and won't need to nap anymore? I suspect the former!

So, that's it for today. It's still horribly hot, in case you were wondering, so again I make my excuses for not going outside to take a walk or even just to sit on the porch. It's 97 and the sun is blazing down in a cloudless sky, the humidity is high, and it's just not my kind of weather, so back to reading.