Achilles rupture - some pain during healing

How is the infra lamp ?

It's great, thanks. Hubby's using it for his sciatica too!

Hi jw .its bobbers .i have been keeping an eye on your progress

Without saying much ..i have been very preoccupied on my own

Progression

glad to see you are progressing. In the right direction .x

P.s .my boot has been off for a week now and am full w/b and

im quite pleased with my progress. I still need some thing to

walk with ,but have Hesitantly walked around the room without

Anything .im seeing physio soon .thanks for the tips your physio

Gave you .x

Hi Bobbers, thanks.

Totally understand that you'd be preoccupied with your own situation. I hope you're feeling more positive about it now and I'm glad you're pleased with your progress.

I've been very low - I've never experienced the emotions of despair like it before - and even now I'm back on two feet (ish!) I'm finding it very hard to feel positive. It's all such a worry, especially hearing Jonathan's current sitution. 

I too am hesitantly and slowly walking around the room, but tend to have my crutches nearby. Whilst I want to make progress, I'm also very scared of doing too much. I imagine we all are.

Keep us posted with your progress and your physio visit.

All the best x

Thanks jw .its a real trial and no mistake and how we progress

without doing too much is a delicate balance .my torn calf on the

other leg is feeling much better ,and im gratefull for having one

good leg .i will Keep you posted hope you feel better soon .x

I had my NHS physio appointment yesterday and he's told me to keep using my crutches for now and to try and make sure that I walk 'properly', ie heel to toe, rather than step-hopping along without them. Not that I can walk properly, of course, as I've got not strength through my toes to push off yet. He got me doing seated toe raises and also using a resistance band (not to pull my foot towards me, but using my foot to stretch it away from me, if that makes sense?). My ankle is so stiff and immobile it's going to take some time to get some movement back in it.

He couldn't believe that the hospital didn't make a follow up appointment to see me, or that they said 'NO passive stretching' on the referral form - if we don't stretch it (carefully) it'll never get better. He's going to follow it up with them and will let me know when I go back in a fortnight.

In the meantime, I'm back to my private physio tomorrow! 

It sounds like we have similar weaknesses.  My PT has me concentrating on my toes. I do the same exercises as you are doing, including using the band. Bands are colour coded for different stretching. Have been using the blue band, but she has now given me a black band, which is much harder to stretch, so require a lot of effort. I can fake standing on my toes, but all my weight is on my good foot. When sitting and doing toe raises, I found that I was lifting at the knee rather than having my toes do the work.  It is a brain thing/communication break down I think for me.  I have to really concentrate to force my toes to do the work and not the other parts of my body. My PT had me sit with feet flat on floor, then put a twenty pound weight on my knee and had me do toe raises.  Yay, I can do it. PT also had me walk -heel down, roll foot thru to toes; feel the toes. Repeat.  It is a mantra when I walk to force myself to walk properly - heel-toe-keep foot facing straight-bend at knee. PT also had me do this walking backwards, when it is the toes that go down first, then roll to the heel.  Apparently I can do that just fine. Go figure.

My latest exercise is balance. Stand on injured foot for 30 seconds.  So far cant do that.  Can stand for a second or so only, then balance goes. Found that when standing on injured foot, all of my weight is in the heel, nothing in the toes.  So also doing toe scrunches - feet flat, standing and leaning forward, forcing toes to scrunch up to hold balance.

Sorry, that was a bit long-winded.

 

Hi Sandy, am I right in thinking you had yours operated on? I didn't and have been on the conservative route, so I'm not sure if the physio and recovery will be quite the same.

I got the 'light' band to start with; it's red. I'm absolutely with you on the knee doing all the work and lifting the foot onto the toes! That said, to start with my toes just lifted/felt weightless, but now I can feell the tiniest amount of pressure in them when I do seated heal raises, so that's something positive. Slowly slowly!

My physio said that walking is the most natural thing we do... until we have to think about it! He's right! I'm still struggling to get my left (injured leg) hip straight before I walk, as well as trying to put weight 50/50 on both legs. I can kind of walk heel-to-toe, but because there's no strength in my toes I have to lift my hip to bring my leg through - it's all so unnatural and I have to really concentrate with every step.

Toe scrunches - I can do them when my foot's on the floor and my toes have some resistance and something to scrunch onto/into, but not when they're mid-air. 

Don't apologise for your long-winded reply; this whole recovery is long-winded! xx

Ha ha.  Yes it is.  No, I did not have surgery. I do toe scrunches when standing. I lean forward and to maintain balance I have to use toes. I find it is a great exercise, both for balance and for toe/ball of foot strengthening.

I can now stand on one foot (bad foot) for about 5-10 seconds, because now my toes are starting to do their job. Prior to that was balancing only on my heel and only for a second or two before I had to grip something to maintain my balance.

Sounds like your making slow and steady progress, Sandy, that's great.

Saw my physio yesterday and he's still trying to get me to walk properly! He's also got me doing standing toe raises, but at the moment most of my weight is on my good leg. I can now use the resistance band to both push my foot away and towards me. Getting my foot past 90 degrees is taking a while.

One strange thing - whenever I stand up and start walking around my lower leg and foot turn rather red! There's practically no swelling and as soon as I sit and raise my leg again it disappears. Physio said he's not sure what it is. Does anyone else have this happen? (I'm now at 13 weeks and nearly two weeks out of the boot)

*you're (darn autocorrect!)

Occasionally, my foot would look darker (redder) than the other. I put it down to blood flow. As in, the bad foot is receiving more than its share of blood flow. If I remember correctly then I also noticed that my bad foot was a bit colder than my good foot. It disappeared after a while and I haven't noticed for last couple of weeks. I also mentioned it to my PT and she advised that if it was intermittent, then was normal.

 

Thanks, Sandy. Yes, mine feels cold to the touch sometimes too. Hopefully it'll stop doing it soon - I guess it's a balance between getting more active and resting/elevating it. Can you remember how many weeks, roughly, did yours do it?

I dont think I have had the 'cold' feeling since I came out of my boot for the last time.  When boot was removed, I walked (limped) on my own, so not full weight bearing, but still I did not use my crutches at all.  I think that regular activity provided enough circulation to stop foot feeling cold.  The redness I still get from time to time, but not often.