Posted , 7 users are following.
Dear All
Before my total hip replacement failed I was swimming something over half a mile every other day so now that I'm walking on the revised hip I asked my physio when I could start swimming using the breaststroke and firmly told not until six months post op. Will have to learn to do something different with my legs!
Cheers Richard
1 like, 21 replies
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vickie06043 RichardKen
Posted
Have you got Nordic Walkers darlin'?
I'm loving mine. Thx to you cuz I'd never, ever heard about them before finding this wonderful support forum :-)
RichardKen vickie06043
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Dear Vickie
I'm delighted that you are finding them helpful. I've been weight bearing for ten days now and take just the one crutch with me when going for a extended walk and much of the time it is just decoration so I feel that walking poles or indeed Nordic Walkers are not needed in my case to maintain a good gait.
I think they can be extremely helpful for many people though as I think maintaining abd establjshing
RichardKen
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All the best
Richard
jimbone RichardKen
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Richard,
I hope your revision continues to heal well. Interested in your swimming routine as thats my current primary exercize as well with about the same duration/interval and I find it very beneficial. With that said- and I haven't had surgery- I find the breast stroke unfeasable. The frog kick irritates my hip when extending my leg to the side so I can easily understand your doctors restrictions. I will occasionally do a lap with the breast stroke very slowly/gently just for the range of motion to keep the joint moving but it is not an effective swimming stroke for me. I do my laps with the crawl but here's the thing: this last year I started using swimming fins. This came about because one of my problem symptoms has been a very uncomfortable [painfull] binding/knot at the top front of my leg, right at the tendon/ligament connection for the quads and other muscles- the flexor zone. It was an intuitive decision to start using fins. I'd been using resistance straps and found hooking one on the top arch of my foot and stretching against it with my leg straight and pulling the leg forward both exercized and relaxed that flexor connection. Using the fins provided more resistance when kicking on the downward stroke of my leg and gave me the same release/strenghtening. I will sometimes leave the pool feeling like I'd just recieved a hip injection- pain free and hardly limping. Doesn't last unfortunately, but I feel and think it's the best thing I can be doing overall. Wanted to pass this on as I've found it so helpful myself and would be pressed to find swimming was on the "do not" list. Worth a discussion with your medical team?
Best regards,
Jimbone
RichardKen jimbone
Posted
Dear Jim
Many thanks for passing on that tip to me. I feel a bit of a wimp only knowing the breaststroke but it's the only strike I ever learnt as a boy and I only returned to swimming when the total ankle replacement on the other side started to fail.
I was so surprised how much I benefitted from a solid hour of doing lengths every other day. I actually bought a full years membership at the local indoor pool. Must have been mad! I put the memberships on hold when the hip failed three months ago but am keen to get my fitness back up again to be in as good a shape as possible for the ankle revision surgery as I'm convinced that being fit dies have a positive impact on surgery.
Cheers Richard
sharon47867 jimbone
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I too find swimming in flippers useful. Can't do breast stroke with my hip restrictions. With flippers can do breast arms and straight kicking with flippers. Also running in water seems good excercise. This forum very helpful.
jimbone sharon47867
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I've read it is not advisable to do the "frog kick" usually used in the breast stroke with fliipers. Could be the kick is already putting enough exertion on the hips/legs without the added resistance of the fins. I've seen swimmers do it with very short fins, and I've tried it with my cut down fins but it didn't really work for me. Straight leg kick though I find very therapuetic and when I'm finished swimming my gait is much more comfortable. Too bad I can't spend the whole of my life in a pool or a warm beach.
staceymaz RichardKen
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Wait, you can swim freestyle right? Also try the backstroke. I was swimming 60 laps up until the day before surgery. I can't wait to get back in the pool. The weather is perfect right now (so. California).
jimbone staceymaz
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Any execize program should be cleared with your medical team and my impression is that freestyle is a good recuperative program; my comment on the breast stroke was that the "frog style" kick it uses may be inappropriate motion following surgery, not like the straight leg kick in freestyle. 60 laps!! Thats a pretty good workout, in a 25 yard pool just shy of 2 miles. Excellent! Can I ask your average time for that? I get in 7-800 yards and call it good. Always so humiliated when the "real" swimmers are there and a 1000 yards is just their warmup. Most of them are excollegiate young women who can kick my butt without even trying and their technique is perfect but I plod along and feel better afterward. Hope you get the swimming clearance soon from your doc.
staceymaz jimbone
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Haha, about 40 minutes, but I break it up with a few kick board laps in there. I was on the swim team in high school (quite a long time ago!), so I do know all my strokes. Unfortunately Breast stroke is my best - all CIF. I am only 4 weeks out of my anterior left hip replacement - so two more weeks until I can get in the pool. Right now I am busy shopping online for swim shorts to cover my scar???? This is actually really bothering me. Maybe in a year my scar will look better, right now it's pretty terrifying.
jimbone staceymaz
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Stacey,
OK. 40 minutes for 3000 yards, now I really do hate you. Do you know Coopers Aerobic Point Chart? He invented the term aerobics in 1968, you can find it online. It became the US Military's standard for fitness. Your swimming is top of the chart good and if you've swam since HS and continue to do so my well informed opinion would be you still have a swimmers musculature and figure which I'm certain will distract anyones attention from a scar. Besides, you're so fast no one will even have time to see it! Hope you get to enjoy the pool again real soon.
staceymaz jimbone
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My pool is only 25 meters so that is only 1500 yards. Trust me Michael Phelps has nothing to worry about. I haven't swam continuously since high school, I am a runner (well not anymore), tennis player, exercise in gym. But I started back in the pool when I couldn't do any of my regular exercise. I was really enjoying it, and I was doing break stroke up until a couple of weeks before surgery. The jacuzzi afterward was icing on the cake!
judith12644 RichardKen
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Hi Richard, don't despair, 6 months will go before you know it. I've got a big outdoor pool right near my house, and I was swimming my regular 1k of breast stroke yesterday morning. It feels so comfortable now, compared with pre op. (I tried swimming at about 7 weeks post op, breaststroke arms, up and down feet, but it wasn't very successful, and I'm rubbish at crawl.) Hang on in there..... Judith
RichardKen judith12644
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Dear Judith
Thanks for your words of encouragement. I will give it a bit longer before I venture to the pool.
I'm a step closer because this morning I've just got back home from a trip to my local post office to tax my car so I can now get to the pool!
Feeling a bit sore because I had to walk down a very long quite steep road and did the same trip yesterday without any walking aids. This is about day four that I've been out on my travels without any form of visable support
judith12644 RichardKen
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staceymaz RichardKen
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judith12644 staceymaz
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RichardKen judith12644
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Ah but I feel that I need to push myself even if it means resting aaftewards! Got the car taxed this morning and then enjoyed the long lost freedom all day!
Cheers Richard
RichardKen staceymaz
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That is great news. It is such good feeling when one pushes and wins!!
All the best. Richard