Progress

On January 11th, the day of Terry's knee surgery, the temps around here were in the high 50s. The next day they reached 60+ with lots of rain. That changed quickly as the temps dropped with the rain on the night of the 12th. We ended with about 1/4 inch of ice covered by about six inches of snow that fell from Friday night through the day Saturday. Luckily, Terry was home already so there was no need to go rushing up to Corning Hospital for visiting. Instead, I spent three hours Sunday using the snowblower to clear the driveway. The ice stayed. And the temperatures remained below freezing for nearly a week.

During that week, we also had another snowfall broken into two three inch episodes--with a visiting therapists sandwiched in between. Of course, I had to shovel the first three inches to clear the drive for the PT. Three hours done by hand left my hobbling almost as badly as Terry! The next day, I went out and shoveled the second three inches--also by hand. So, all in all, I spent nine hours over four days in single to barely double digit temps shoveling snow that was, thankfully, light and fluffy.

Yesterday, Friday, the sun came out and started to melt some of the snow on the roof and deck. Today, it's also sunny with temps into the mid 40s. The driveway still has a thick layer of ice that even a little salt and a lot of ashes haven't helped melt but the predicted warm temps (more 40s) and rain may eventually make a dent in that ice.

Terry has been hobbling around the house with the help of a walker and is progressing nicely after having had a partial replacement of her left knee. She's taken over the first floor bedroom (our normally "cat free zone") with easy access to her sewing room and the bathroom. Julie cat won't let her go anywhere without her--including the "cat free" bedroom. She (Julie wants to cuddle and cleave to her mommy to the point that she will miss a meal if need be.

Terry has 24 staples along the main incision into her left knee and another four each at holes above and below that; holes that must have been made for the assisting robot to hold her leg in position. All 32 staples will be removed on Tuesday over in Wellsboro. The visiting PT has given her exercises to do and has monitored her activity around the house twice now and she also is impressed with Terry's progress. Still, Terry is complaining that the staples are limiting her motion as they pull when she bends her leg doing exercises.

I'm trying to remember what my own progress was like back in 2013, but our situations aren't very similar. I had both knees totally replaced and then spent four days in the old Corning Hospital before being moved over to St. Joe's in Elmira for rehab and introductory PT. Terry was in on Thursday and sent home on Friday having had only two sessions with a therapist to give her an idea of the exercises she should do at home.

Meanwhile, on top of my snow shoveling duties, I'm doing all the cooking and cleaning with plenty of verbal assistance either from the sewing room, bedroom or directly over my shoulder. (Cooking has been relatively easy. Terry roasted a turkey on Wednesday before her surgery so we had two-three days of left overs before I froze the rest of the bird. Spaghetti, venison steak, salmon fillet, scallops...nothing super fancy and most of it done easily enough in a frying pan on the stove top.)