Knee Replacement Surgery

How exciting – not!

Perhaps I should say straight away that I’m 50 and that’s apparently very young to be undergoing this type of surgery? (So that’s one reason I decided to document my experience). I began having syptoms when I was 39. My son and I regularly went on a 4 mile bike ride every evening to keep fit and to chat about the day, but after a while I kept getting a very uncomfortable clicking feeling in my left knee. So much so that I would stick my leg out at a rakish angle and pedal with my right. Eventually I couldn’t pedal at all and that’s when I decided to go to my doctor.

As all doctors here in the UK do, he abdicated all responsibilty for a diagnosis and referred me to the hospital. This meant a 6 month wait to see someone, during which time I developed a fetching limp.

The consultant decided on an exploratory operation to see what was wrong (another long wait), and as a lay on the recovery bed groggy from the anaesthetic, he told me that it was osteoarthritis and that there was nothing he could do.

I was shocked because I only associated this condition with the elderly, and also because there was no reason why I should have to limp to my grave.

I went back to my doctor and said I’d like a second opinion as I was only 41 and not prepared to put up with the pain until I died. He seemed to agree and referred me to the only other knee surgeon at the local hospital.

At this time I was in a lot of pain and the waiting list was still 6 months long so my parents kindly paid for me to have an initial consultation privately. That way I could go straight on the list for another operation if necessary. And that’s what happened, I had an ‘arthroscopy and debridement’ which just meant that I had a sanding and cleaning of the bony surfaces of the knee. It meant a couple of weeks off work, but I didn’t feel the benefits of this surgery for nearly 2 years as it improved very slowly.

Over the next 10 years I had another 2 operations on my knee and finally was told that the next one would have to be a knee replacement, but that I was really too young and could I wait?

So my choices were:

1. Continue limping, saying to friends and family “you go ahead without me, I’ll be fine,” carry on putting on weight inexorably as my ability to walk diminishes (so putting more stress on my knee) or
2. Have major surgery, 6 – 8 weeks off work (I work full-time), be unable to bend my leg as well as before BUT instead of slowly getting worse, slowly get better, and then start doing things with my family again.

I must stress that I’m not as disabled as some people waiting for knee replacement surgery, I can park my car in the car park and walk into the office. I can walk up a couple of flights of stairs, although going down is more problematic. But I can’t walk far and keep crutches in the car for longer walks than just into the office. I can’t go sight-seeing or on a shopping jaunt without having to stop every half hour or so for a sit down and can only cook if I have a chair in the kitchen. My son has stopped asking me if I want to go for a walk with him and that breaks my heart.

It’s not so much the walking that hurts as the compression on the joint caused by being upright – then walking hurts – does that make sense? In other words if I stood for half an hour it would hurt as much as if I walked for half an hour (if only).