I’ll hopefully be starting social netball again in a few months so fingers crossed that I don’t do it a thrid time!

Jason

Feel good!

I broke mine playing indoor netball. I didn’t learn my lesson the first time! Or second actually, am keen to get back to it again. The 1st time I was just running hard in a straight line then pushed off on my left leg to cut in for an intercept and my knee just collapsed. It was one of those slow mo moments when I knew that my knee was bent at the completely wrong/un-natural angle and something bad was happening. The 2nd time all that I did was jump up to catch a pass and came down slightly off balance and my right knee ripped. Everyone that saw it thought what’s all the fuss about as I was rolling around on the ground in miseary (having known what I’d done again) and pain.

With the first knee I also had a meniscus tear. The bone growth doesn’t sound like much fun. You have to trust you dr to a certain degree and don’t internet diagnos yourself! I was convinced that I had cancer once and what I had was far from it.

Jason.

Thank you for your reply. I was feeling a little down today and your mail gave me hope. I am sorry that you had to go through two ACL reconstructions. I hope that you`re doing well now and fighting the fight. Based on what you have told me, I guess I`ll keep having my girl push my knee down and give me pain every morning ( lol ), and hope that this knee will go down soon. How did you tear your ACL , what where you doing? Did you have any kind of meniscus tear?

As far as patella pain, I can bear that. I also developed heterotrophic ossification on the side of my knee. It`s basically a bone growth; have you ever heard of it? The doctor says not to worry , but it`s hard kind of not to.

Looking forward to hearing from you.

Thanks Jason

don’t give up it all takes time, a little bit of courage, and unfortunately some hard work and persistency with the physio.

I’m not sure what you’re doing for physio but an exercyle is also great. I got a cheap 2nd hand bike and have it planted in front of the tv to keep me distracted. If you are finding the physio hard remember that “no pain no gain” is true, so think of pain as your friend when you’re getting to the tough end of your exercise reps. It’s telling you that your doing the work, getting better and are closer to your end goals.

I’ve posted a few times here so am repeating myself but it takes time to get the leg fully striaight, don’t get dissheartened, you’ll get there. Same for the walk, once you rebuild the muscle and your confidence it’ll happen. Part of it’s a physcological game with your head. You think that your knee is really weak and you’re scared of breaking the new graft but, while taking it easy, it’s actually stronger than you think and can handle walking on safe even ground no worries (though please check with your physio about this!).

I’ve broken both ACL’s on seperate occassions. The first time it took me about a week to get off both crutches and 2 weeks to abanden them completely. The 2nd time around, because I knew what was going on, I was only on the crtuches for 1 day.

Everyone’s pace is different though so again don’t get dissheartened, we all know what you’re going through, it’s not fun, not easy, but you’ll get there.

Jason

good work on all the rehab. it sucks but it’ll all pay off. My physio said that I only had to do about 40mins worth 3-4 times a week but I did the same as you and it was worth it. I did both of my ACL’s with about 18 months between the 2 separate injuries. Don’t worry about the limp it will go and the full extension will come. It took about 9 months for my first knee and 6 for the 2nd (extension not limp, that’ll be gone soon). The bad news is that the frontal knee pain takes quite some time to go, if ever. I’m now 3 years past my pattelle graft (got a hamstring for the 2nd) and it still hurts to kneel on it.

I still rehab/exercise 3 times a week for about 40-60mins just to keep it strong, feel better cause it’s good for you and to help fight the middle aged spread which has arrived since I turned 40.

I can’t advise on the fexion as that wasn’t used by by physio.

All the best.

Jason