Recovering at Home

Hi everyone

It’s Naomi here, Neil’s wife who he has been blogging about this week. First of all thank you for everyone’s kind thoughts and well wishes – it’s wonderful to get these from people I don’t even know! I thought you would like a brief update on my situation (it’s always hard writing about yourself).

Neil mentioned that I had a bone scan at the hospital, which was ok, except for the numerous painful attempts at trying to find a vein to put the dye into (I have tiny veins, which makes it hard – but I do have a port-a-cath which they should have used – but that’s a whole other story). This was completed and I had to then wait for the head orthopaedic doctor to look at it before they would give me a diagnosis. I also had to wait for some more blood tests as they lost one of the vials and had to re-take the blood – oh joy! So as a result had to stay another night in there.

Late on Friday arvo they told me that my hip prosthesis has started to loosen (as they suspected). I have had the replacement joint for at least 10 years (which is what their approximate life span is). You can see with the photo below what the prostheses look like. (Neil had to have a photo :P ) I have had both done, but the left is still feeling pretty good.

So I was allowed to go home on Friday evening which was great. Since then I have been getting better VERY slowly each day, with less pain and more movement. I am unable to walk unaided still and am using a combination of different crutches and a wheelchair for going to appointments etc. I did hydrotherapy yesterday which was great and I felt fabulous after it with me being able to walk a few steps unaided. Today I am a bit sore which was expected. I also went to physio’ today which was good. It was more of an assessment, but she gave me some new comfy crutches and some great tips for getting up from a bed (which I have not been able to do).

So that’s it so far. I am having the rest of the week off work, and will re-assess things next Monday. I have an ortho’ appointment on April 22nd where we will discuss if it needs operating on soon or not.

Thanks again to my loving husband Neil, who is there for me all the time and is just wonderful. The poor thing has not had much sleep so his lack of blogging is partly my fault (sorry to all of his subscribers). Hopefully I will not need to rely on him as much in the coming weeks and he can get back to his normal daily life too.

Love Naomi xx