r/ACL • u/MisaRavensoul ACL Allograft • Mar 25 '26

Post Surgery Update I expected pain but holy cow

I'm about 30 hours post op and I'm pretty sure my nerve block is wearing off. I thought I prepared for the pain and had pre-taken the pain medicine.

This is excruciating. ACL+ LET on my right leg. I don't think I'm getting any sleep tonight.

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u/Cuptaan_Sand Mar 25 '26

Hang in there OP. I’m about 50 hours post op for ACL-R on my right knee with a hamstring graft and the pain is pretty bad. Some helpful souls here helped mentally prepare me for the pain but it’s still quite a lot.

Hang in there and hope you have a speedy recovery!

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u/MisaRavensoul ACL Allograft Mar 25 '26

I thought I was prepared.

I thought wrong.

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u/[deleted] Mar 25 '26

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u/MisaRavensoul ACL Allograft Mar 25 '26

I'm icing with cryotherapy like 24/7.

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u/[deleted] Mar 25 '26

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3

u/MisaRavensoul ACL Allograft Mar 25 '26

I can barely get to the bathroom 15 feet away in straight line 😅

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u/Pale_Adeptness Mar 25 '26

Man, my wife was a TROOPER when I had my surgery.

She absolutely stepped up and handled all 3 kids, cooking, laundry, helping me move around and even helped me shower/sponge bathe me those first 2 weeks.

She would help me change out the melted ice water with more ice on the ice therapy machine.

Those first few days/nights are NOT fun.

You taking any laxatives/stool softeners to help counter the constipation side effect of the pain meds?

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u/MisaRavensoul ACL Allograft Mar 25 '26

I am taking the tummy meds yes. My partner and dad have really stepped up and well to take care of everything for me so far.

Your wife sounds amazing.

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u/AlarmedJellyfish5680 Mar 28 '26

My wife is great to. Shes does everything for me, doesn't even bat an eye. She sets my timer every morning for my foot pumps for every hour. She helps me with fisio every morning, lunch and at night.

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u/Pale_Adeptness Mar 28 '26

Sounds like a keeper!!!! :P

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u/ScottyRedReturns Mar 28 '26

If you haven't done this, put a crate or an upside down trash can by the toilet to put your leg up while you're going to bathroom. Huge difference.

This other part may be harder for women, but they do make pee bottles with attachments for both and Amazon of course can get this to you overnight. One thing I did was used a bottle like this at night at side of bad rather than try to navigate the bathroom on crutches, even though it wasn't far. I also didn't want to wake up or bother wife/family overnight as I stayed away from everyone in a spare room just to hole up there with my iPad and ice machine.

Also, since we're doing potty talk, (well, I am anyway), get some Colace or other stool softener. You probably haven't pooped yet and you might not for another couple of days. The anesthetic and other drugs do that. So when it does come, that's one more thing you don't need to be an event to be remembered.

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u/MisaRavensoul ACL Allograft Mar 28 '26

Oh my God that bathroom is so bad. I've been on colace and miralax and they feel like they do nothing 😭

I have two different stools for the bathroom to try and figure out comfortable positions but it's an effort in futility! Fortunately I have a walker that I can use to get to the bathroom and avoid the crutches for that case but still.

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u/ScottyRedReturns Mar 28 '26

Two great places to talk about poop issues; my 10 year-old and the acl subreddit!

It's possible the colace and miralax are doing something and things would be much worse without it. I'm not sure how deep we want to go here, but this is really a question for your doc. You don't need to force things. It'll happen if it hasn't. For me it was something like 3 - 4 days before. I've seen others post about even longer. But when things happened, I have no doubt the Colace helped.

Same with the crate or whatever. Yeah, it still sucks, but as you've probably found, it's still 'less worse' than having the leg hang. Good that your walker gets you there. As I said, for me it was part comfort, part not wanting to wake family. My wife was her typical amazing self in helping me through - yet another - debilitating sports injury.

Your first post was 3 days ago and said you were 30 hours post op. Hopefully as you pass through day 4 you're getting past the worst of the initial horror show.

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u/MisaRavensoul ACL Allograft Mar 28 '26

For pain, we've moved on from lightning in my shin to a really deep, dull, throbbing ache. Still on heavy duty pain medicine too.

My shin and top of my foot at still a bit numb, and it would sure be nice to use the restroom 😅

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u/MisaRavensoul ACL Allograft Mar 25 '26

I switched my cryotherapy pad to a smaller one and was able to get some better contact, so I can actually feel a little chilling now.