Ankle surgery: 5 things I did to prepare.

Here's the story: 11 days ago, I had surgery on my ankle. So for the past 11 days, I've been 99% stuck at home, spending most of my time trying to arrange my pillows in a way that keeps my foot up and my laptop usable. (My neck and shoulders aren't on speaking terms with me right now... but they sure haven't been quiet.)

To fill some of the time, I figured I'd compile the things I've learned from the experience, and share my take on how to prepare for ankle surgery.

It all started with a shark bite when I was visiting the beach in California. It was a harrowing experience, but I survived to tell the tale.

Also, that's a lie, which you are obligated to make up when the fact is you actually just tripped out your front door.

I found a foot and ankle specialist and went there (diagnostic details later), where I got this hot, hot specimen of footwear right here.

Aw yeah, work that boot.

(As an aside - take my advice and try to find one person in the office to remember by name and talk to about your schedules every time. Though my doctor was great, his front office was NOT great; among other things, I ended up waiting an extra week for surgery because the office originally scheduled me for a day when the doctor wasn't even going to be there!

Anyway...)

1. Find someone who can stay with you.

And set the date for your surgery based on when they can be there for you. If you have surgery, it's required that you have someone who can take you home - but equally important is that for the next few days you're going to need someone present with you 24/7 who can help you sit up and get you food and is willing to be called for in the middle of the night if necessary. Especially that first night. More on that point in a bit!

My lovely caretaker was my best friend's mother, my awesome Mom Away From Mom. She arrived the night before my surgery, walked around the grocery store beside me in one of those scooters (yes, ME in the scooter, not her, and she has a replaced knee - that's love) and stayed with me for the next three days afterwards. My rapidly-increasing nervousness leading up to surgery was much alleviated by the fact that she was going to be there for me.

2. Get your surroundings ready.

Once I knew I was going to have surgery, I got some help to rearrange my room and ridiculously tiny bathroom to make it easier to access. My TV moved into my room. I stocked up on food, movies, nonperishable snacks, gentle foods for the couple days after anesthesia. I bought plenty of ibruprofen (though leading up to the surgery they restricted me to acetomenophen instead - lamesauce).

I also bought crutch pads. As a reasonably in-shape grown-up, these are ESSENTIAL. I don't remember experiencing this when I had crutches as a kid, but let me tell you, a few days into getting around my place of employment, my sides were chafed all to heck and my hands felt like bruises with fingers. It was so exhausting getting around, a couple times after work I literally pulled into my driveway, leaned my seat back, and had a nap. It was still tiring after the pads, but less, and certainly less painful and thus faster. It probably doesn't matter what kind you get, but I got a Crutcheze set. I got a cute bright pattern, which got me comments and compliments wherever I went, which has been nice during an otherwise not so pleasant experience!

3. Run through your post-surgery routines.

Dress rehearsals are important. The most important one I did in this case was - I practiced bathing without getting my foot wet, which is a (sucky) fact of life till the stitches get taken out. An educational experience for sure! Since I have a shower stall about the size of my body, I quickly found I had to use my roommate's bathtub. The folding shower stool I have was quite necessary, and the chair I placed next to the tub with a cushion made of a couple fluffy towels was equally essential for foot-holding purposes. I also was able to see things I'd forgotten, like lotion and deodorant, while I still had the mobility to fix it. I also got one of those cast covers.


Oh, and Cetaphil! Cetaphil Gentle Cleanser was a freakin' godsend. Trust me, make sure you have some. More on that in my next installment.

4. Assemble your important little things.

The night before surgery, I made sure that things like bottled water, lip balm, a couple books, remotes, and my laptop were accessible from my bed.

To prepare for the trip to my surgery appointment, I also packed a bag that included my fully-charged phone, my wallet (with my ID, debit, insurance, and prescription cards), all my paperwork, my house keys, my lip balm!!, a small blanket, a book, and T-Pain, the origami T-Rex my boyfriend made to protect me.


As instructed, I hadn't eaten or drunk anything after midnight (though prior to that I was treated to some amazing blue crab ravioli and gelato from this here place).

Once I arrived at my surgery appointment, aside from page after page of paperwork and routine questions and introductions from medical personnel (there were a few from my college in there!), I was just waiting. I spent over an hour lounging in the gown and cot, partially by myself because Mom Away From Mom took the opportunity to go get my prescriptions. The waiting wasn't so bad; in fact I found that I was really glad to have it. I got to de-stress by calling and texting some loved ones, reading my book, facebooking it up for a while...

Then they swept in, and it's kind of a blur. I remember they put some air-squeezing things on my legs; the nurse injected something into my hand that made my IV needle painless, even when she had to move it around a bit because I have tiny blood vessels or something. They also put a nerve block in my leg, which would knock out all sensations for 12 to 24 hours, but that was after I was asleep. My least favorite part - and suck it did - was, strangely enough, when the saline from the IV started going into my arm. No medicine yet, but oh my, I felt intensely uncomfortable and pretty nauseated and almost passed out! I remember them putting some strong-smelling stuff under my nose and giving me an oxygen mask, which made me feel a bit better and more alert. Which is the last thing I remember, ironically.


(I never did tell you what exactly they were going to do, did they? Well, here it is. They removed my os trigonum, which I hadn't known about before I rolled my ankle. In fact my os trigonum is the reason my ankle has mysteriously hurt off and on since I was 11 or 12, sometimes really badly, and I really can't wait to experience what it'll feel like when I'm all healed up from this.)

(Also, because of a strange sharp tingly on-and-off pain I've had for years that felt like a spur on the bottom of my heel, they took the opportunity (don't worry, they asked first) to reshape my heel to give some of my nerves more of the room they need. Apparently this need is connected to the fact that I have a flat foot, which I "fixed" on my right side with exercises, which didn't work as well on the left side, which apparently had something to do with my os trigonum... ahem. Anyway.)

5. Pain: know what to expect and be prepared to adequately manage it.

My foot's like, I got a pedicure for THIS?

Next thing, I was waking up in the same place I'd been, with the lights dimmed and my foot bundled up. No pain; because of the nerve block, everything below my knee was numb, and I couldn't wiggle my toes even if I had the inclination. I was groggy, but apparently alert enough to take a picture.

So after I was good to move around, I was in the wheelchair and in the car and on my way home. I don't remember the rest of the day very well now, but I know I was doing well and wasn't in pain.

... Until about 3:30 on the morning, that is. I woke up to a strong tingling, the warning the nurse anesthetist had told me about that my nerve block would be wearing off in about 30 minutes. Nervous, I reached for my Percocet prescription. I could take one or two at a time. I started with one, but my anxiety was building, and within a few minutes I took another.


I fell asleep, only to wake up a few hours later with gnawing pain really starting to build; I took another Percocet. And I did the same thing again a few hours after that. By 9 in the morning, I'd taken 4 out of the 6 tablets I was allowed, and was about to take another. Mom Away From Mom was not too enthused by this! From this point forward, she kept my medicine bottles and kept track of the timing because I couldn't, and laid out my overnight medicines for me on my nightstand after the first (and only) time I had to wake her up in the middle of the night. This is why having someone there overnight is so good, and it continued to be important, because in those first days the pain didn't always completely disappear (this is normal) and it would have been easy to overdose myself.

Either way, it was apparent that the Percocet was not enough. She called the doctor's office, and before long they had prescriptions for Tramadol and Nucynta ready in case I needed them. I remember the rest of that morning as an intense, escalating haze of pain - need them I did. She had to drive to the doctor's office to get the prescriptions, then drive them over to the pharmacy, then wait for them... meanwhile, at home, I turned on a funny movie and didn't stop crying off and on until after my first dose of the real deal kicked in. It was a rough day. Lesson learned: it's much harder to gain control over your pain after it's gotten out of hand. Talk to your doctor and have the stronger stuff available up front. It might help if you know how certain pain meds affect you - I avoided Vicodin for this reason, but that was all I knew.

I had a little dizziness and nausea after eating too much and too fast after my first dose of the Tramadol, but not much after that. And the next few days, though still hard, got increasingly better. :)

In my next installment, I'll write about finally freakin' bathing, weaning myself off the hard stuff, and things that changed after I got my half-cast off...