Cheilectomy Day 5

This is the first day off the pain meds. I swapped over to one 200mg ibuprofen in the morning and the evening, supplemented with a 500mg paracetamol during the day. It was fine, but I really needed that ibuprofen when I went to bed tonight!

This is probably due to increased activity - I was moving around a fair bit, and sat on the sofa watching a movie last night with the foot on a stool - and there was less time with the foot raised above heart level.

I can move the toe a bit now, just gently downwards - haven't attempted trying to bend it upwards yet. I do gentle exercises - rotating the ankles on both legs, gently flexing the ankle back and forth, and using a stretchy band on the non-surgical foot to stretch the calf muscles, keeping both legs elevated up a wall and feeling the lovely flow of fresh blood as I lower them down to waist level again.

It helps to bring a bit of massage to the feet, the ankles, the toes and the calves all benefit from stimulating the blood flow. There's a little bit of bruising to the surgery side ankle where I kicked off when I was being stuck for the surgeon to find the nerve on the day of surgery.

I bruise really easily - and it's normally long-lasting - so this is no surprise.

Comments

Cheilectomy 5 months

As each month milestone approaches, it feels like the toe is worst than the month before, but when I read back, I can see that's a fallacy. I guess, as it gets better, I just measure its progress day by day, so some days it feels worse and some days it feels better. And that's kinda the lesson learned in this post. For example, the last couple of weeks we've had a cold snap in the UK (temperatures down to -2 in the daytime), so I've had to swap the trainers to more suitable walking boots (something I couldn't wear last month). I've been in the walking boots every day now for a couple of weeks. It feels roomier than when I tried the boots last month, so that indicates the swelling (from Covid probably) has gone down. It's more comfortable to wear the boots now, so clearly that's progress. I've been doing around five miles in them, but do find that it's a matter of one day on, one day off. So if I do a five mile walk one day, I'm not up for a...

Cheilectomy - Day 14

Lots of mobility now - whizzing around doing everything for myself, except shopping and walking the dog. Can walk ok in the surgical shoe and do stuff like preparing meals and washing up, getting up and down stairs, walking to the car. Still icing the foot just to ward off any swelling, wiggling the toe and stretching it. Sometimes, without warning it has a sudden ache - similar but not as intense to the pain I'd experience often before surgery. Went out to the local tea rooms for a couple of hours with the Sunday papers, so feeling a little more normal. Looking forward to tomorrow when I have my post-op appointment back at the hospital, and to losing the surgical shoe and the bulky bandages.

Cheilectomy - Day 20-21

It's the 3 week mark and it's been a busy weekend - well, it's all relative. I've been able to get on a bike - lowering the saddle so I can easily put my foot down. It's been more a case of rolling along at walking pace than actually 'cycling' - the foot feels too fragile to go straight off out of the traps onto the road in case of any sudden mishaps that could mean mucking up the osteotomy before it's healed. On healing, the incision wound is finally sealing up and looking less angry. Still haven't gone swimming - still looks like it needs a little more time to scar properly before risking the water (submerging the skin, risk of tearing, and infection from sea water). Hope that changes this coming week. I can't feel the top of the toe near the incision at all - it's numb. Hoping that changes. Doing the exercises as directed - push and pull until it's uncomfortable twice a day for 5 minutes. I was able to walk the dog to the park and ba...

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