My first few weeks of rehab have given me insight into the ups and downs that this ACL recovery will involve. On the one hand the last 10 weeks since surgery have come with a lot of progress, yet on the other I somehow secretly hoped I’d be further ahead. On paper my rehab involves 6 phases – with each phase having milestones I have to hit in order to move onto the next. I’ll go into more detail about the phases later on but for now I’ll keep it pretty brief.
My first big milestone was walking again after 6 weeks on crutches. Although it was far from perfect, and I didn’t fully trust my knee, this gave me a genuine sense of progress and achievement. Walking allowed me to rely less on others for help, and regain a sense of independence. About two days later I started being allowed to do more in the gym, and I was amazed by how much my knee could actually do. One of the scariest exercises that I started with was Bar Bell Back squats. The movement was painful, and because of that I often found myself double-checking with my physio, and asking if it was normal for it to hurt during the exercise. There was a small part of me that thought the pain meant it was going to tear again. But it didn’t, and I started getting my confidence back in the gym. Once I pushed past the pain barrier, the gym sessions became a little easier, allowing me to push myself harder and lift heavier weights without that same fear of re-injury. This shift in mindset made me appreciate what my body was capable of, and I felt really proud of myself each time I did something that I couldn’t do the day before.
At the same time as all this, I was unable to hit another milestone of bending my knee to 120-degree range which would allow me to move onto the next phase. Even though my physio assured me that I shouldn’t be worried, I was frustrated at myself for being “behind” in my rehab already.
Experiencing such contrasting emotions so close together has been really hard to navigate, and I’m starting to understand that recovery is not only physically draining, but takes a toll emotionally too. For the first time in my life I’ve started to experience true sadness. No matter what I do to try take my mind off it, it sometimes feels like the sadness is there in the background, weighing me down. It doesn’t feel like that every day, but on the days it does it’s definitely a lot harder to push myself physically. I’m learning to understand that that is part of the reality of rehab. On the harder days where I can’t lift as much as I could the week before, or when I’m not up to doing conditioning, I try to remind myself of the bigger goal, and why I’m working so hard.
I’m working towards playing football again, and even though there’s the uncertainty that I might not come back as good as I was before, I know for a fact that I will come back stronger than I was before. After almost 8 weeks back in the gym, I’m already lifting heavier weights than I was before my injury, which is crazy to think about. With each step, whether that’s forward or backwards, I’m learning to be nicer to myself and beginning to understand that progress isn’t always a straight line.
Until next time,
p.s. i just met my physio Yanek and he confirmed that on Saturday 28th September, I reached 125 degrees range in my leg. :)