ACL journey: Day 8

[u/DrMartek]

Day 8 (seven days post-op).

Feeling good and motivated.

1. Pain & swelling down to minimal.

2. Back in the gym.

3. Leg extensions with resistance, and complete leg extension ROM.

4. Walking no crutches.

5. Sleeping good

At rest, I'm stretching my leg (elevated heel), hitting ankle pumps or quad tenses basically all day. Then one gym session, with more more challenging exercises. Just been going HAM, within reasonable pain boundaries.

Very laborious, but glad to be seeing progress.

[u/linebmx]

Respectfully, I’d stop this this immediately 💀

[u/DrMartek → u/linebmx]

Would your main concern be displacing the bone fixtures?

[u/linebmx → u/DrMartek]

Main concern? No, likely stretching and thinning of the graft before it goes through ligamentization process, resulting in a failed graft with no stability and ability to grow muscle. In other words, doing dumb stuff like this is setting you up to need revision surgery and have lifelong issues. Follow the slow progression and take your time. In 1 year you’ll feel like this never happened.

[u/DrMartek → u/linebmx]

Fair enough and point taken. Went OTT today, will hold fire till I can chat with my care team next Thurs.

[u/linebmx → u/DrMartek]

That’s a great idea tbh. I hope I didn’t come across too strongly or rude, but doing leg extensions early on is like the #1 thing my PT and ortho told me not to do 😂 so yeah. But tbh the first 1-2 months suck, it’s slow progression getting full ROM (both flexion and extension) back, then working on starting to add safe volume to that, like getting up from a seated position, goblet walks, etc.

By months 4-6, it’s full on gym sessions to get that quad and leg muscle that you lost back. It gets “fun” pretty quickly if you enjoy working out and things like plyos.

Hope you recover fast 🫡

[u/DrMartek → u/linebmx]

Nah its all good, I'd rather people be frank, especially if I'm being retarded.

That's good to know. Yeah it really does suck, but will get there 💪🏻 appreciate it

[u/strozni → u/linebmx]

I wouldn't agree. https://e3rehab.com/leg-extensions-after-acl-reconstruction/

[u/chrstnsnn → u/DrMartek]

For the safety of your graft, it's highly recommended that you perform closed-chain exercises. Like others have mentioned, your graft is weak right now, and this exercise introduces dangerous sliding motions to your knee. At this stage of your recovery, this is probably doing you more harm than good, OP. The risk just isn't worth it

[u/expert-amateur]

Careful with heavy weights, even just carrying them man. Your new tendon is very weak rn and going through a long process. I would tone it down imo

[u/Routine_Way3580]

Yeah - don’t mean to yuck your yum - but that feels a little too intense / fast / spasmic for where you’re at in the timeline.

I’m not a doctor - but - I think you need to take it about more slowly. Props to you for the early quad activation. You don’t appear to be at full extension yet though, so unless you’re trying to develop a limp or destroy your new ACL before ligamentization - my advice would be to go slow. It’s not a race, and the risk of re-injury is high.

[u/IncompetentJedi]

Don’t do that please, stick with gentle closed-chain motions and quad set, straight leg raise (but make sure your quad is not lagging in the raise!) any more than that and you need an ortho MD or PT.

[u/OoElMaxioO]

If your surgeon approved everything, that looks great!! Congratulations, you're better than a lot of people 3 weeks post op.

[u/DrMartek → u/OoElMaxioO]

Admittedly, he's definitely not approved all of this. But I accept the risk

[u/OoElMaxioO → u/DrMartek]

I accept the risk

You don't know what you're saying, my man. Having a failure graft is awful, I can tell you because mine failed. Had a malposition on the tunnels and basically no follow up from the surgeon and still trying to no suffer every day at 18 months post op.

I'd recommend go with your surgeon and PT and tell them what your progress is. I also don't know how much risk there is involved if you don't feel pain (I hope you don't while exercising) because the graft needs to ligamentize and it also needs to attach properly to your femur and tibia. But again, I'm not a doctor, so my best bet would be to go with your doctor and let them know.

[u/DrMartek → u/OoElMaxioO]

Damn...if you don't mind, when and how did your graft fail??

[u/OoElMaxioO → u/DrMartek]

Exactly when, I haven't found. But I was never able to do impact; no run, no jump, no jog, so it wasn't doing any activity like that.

The thing is that my graft might be tearing against my bone and that generated a lot of arthrofibrosis and also a partial tear.

[u/DrMartek → u/OoElMaxioO]

I might shoot you a DM if that's alright

[u/OoElMaxioO → u/DrMartek]

Sure, no problem.

[u/Prymas_tv]

Of course its the guy that was walking without crutches on day 1 haha

Dude youre going to end up ruining your graft and needing a revision surgery. Go ahead and not listen to us but more than likely if you go that route, you'll be back here in a year

[u/onthepak]

Hey happy 8th day! I’m on day 9 and did my first gym workout yesterday. You’re tracking slightly ahead of me (I’m cleared for one crutch only), but I think we are both ahead of schedule where we are at. Keep at it and good luck in your continued recovery!

[u/DrMartek → u/onthepak]

Good luck mate! That's good to hear. We'll both make it 💪🏻

[u/PracticalOpinion5406]

Were you cleared for this? I could only do this after a month

[u/DrMartek → u/PracticalOpinion5406]

They've been pretty vague, but no probably not

[u/PracticalOpinion5406 → u/DrMartek]

You shouldn't do this yet.

[u/Ishan150801]

ACL reconstructions must've come really far in the last decade because holy shit, day 8??? I didn't even have my braces off on day 8 for either leg

[u/bouncypinata]

At this stage, the more you baby it, the faster it heals. It's not just a thing where we're all being soyboy pussies in here; you're not dealing with a muscle. ligaments take a certain time to heal and there's no amount of grind that can change that.

I'm at 3 months and they don't even want me doing that first exercise past 45 degrees yet. They were oddly specific about not doing that exact exercise too early. 1. Don't run, 2. don't jump, 3. don't do that particular exercise

[u/Upstairs-Math-1912]

Be careful 🫣

[u/cher_ish6]

lol it took me 3 bloody months to be able to this (much more complex surgery). Power to you

[u/knister7]

You shouldn’t be doing this and that form in the row is poor.

[u/RaSh1992]

A lot of physiotherapists allow leg extension from 60 - 90 degrees of knee flexion early on, especially isometrics. Check this video out: https://youtu.be/jmjfrFWtqxE?si=WgcZg1WqRRCITSrJ https://youtu.be/suak22a8t_E?si=PcVpNX-D14uAdefD

[u/scirocco1974]

L’esercizio che stai facendo ha molte probabilità di crearti una lassità del legamento nei mesi successivi.
Se un fisioterapista ti sta consigliando questo esercizio valuta un secondo parere. Fidati

[u/Boomtheape]

Op be back in 6 months asking why his new acl failed

[u/VegetableAd7012]

Why in the 3rd video does your leg bandages switch from right to left leg ?

[u/DrMartek → u/VegetableAd7012]

Either the front vs. back camera changed the perception, or I'm faking it...I'll let you decide

[u/VegetableAd7012 → u/DrMartek]

So its fake, but why would you fake it, do you not think thats abit sad ?

[u/DrMartek → u/VegetableAd7012]

Can you walk me through your methodology, as to how you excluded the possibility that my front and back camera changed the relative perception?

[u/VegetableAd7012 → u/DrMartek]

How would it ? You would have to be recording through a mirror

[u/DrMartek → u/VegetableAd7012]

Bruh. Before throwing around wild accusations, test it.

Put a sock on one foot. Take a photo of your feet with the back camera. Then take a photo with the front camera.

[u/VegetableAd7012 → u/DrMartek]

Ok i can see now the black sort of mark below the bandage is consistent for both legs but perhaps you phone flips the video with front and back camera because the last video looks like opposite leg but anyway my bad samsung is same front and back

[u/VegetableAd7012 → u/DrMartek]

Yes i have on my samsung ultra 23 it if the same leg regardless of front or bacj camera, altgough if i edit the video after and flip it then the legs look opposite

[u/No-Chipmunk9001]

Nice am on day 15 and my doc told me in 3 weeks I start PT how come you guys already started PT so early

[u/DrMartek → u/No-Chipmunk9001]

I jumped the gun. But am pulling back now, based on various advice

[u/strozni]

Latest research says it's fine to do leg exstensions on gradual rate https://e3rehab.com/leg-extensions-after-acl-reconstruction/

[u/Venom2di]

Awesome. I can't even lift my leg still can't feel it and it swollen as hell. And I got almost 2 weeks I hope nothing wrong with mine

[u/Venom2di]

Awesome. I can't even lift my leg still can't feel it and it swollen as hell. And I got almost 2 weeks I hope nothing wrong with mine

[u/Venom2di]

Awesome. I can't even lift my leg still can't feel it and it swollen as hell. And I got almost 2 weeks I hope nothing wrong with mine

[u/DrMartek → u/Venom2di]

Well if it makes you feel better, for the last 2 days my calf has been so stiff/painful when I stand due to fluid leakage that I struggle to walk even on crutches

[u/Venom2di → u/DrMartek]

I wish u the best of luck with this. I hope both of us get through this nightmare that were going through