Today we went to Stoke Mandeville Hospital to see Yvonne's physiotherapist for the first visit of the year.  Keith checked Yvonne's hip and her ability to stand only on one leg at a time and also to bend over and to stretch her leg backwards and out to the side.  He was very happy with her progress and and he has signed her off because he is satisfied that she does not need any more physio.
This marks another milestone on Yvonne's road to full recovery.

Getting Back To Normal

On Tuesday 15th November Yvonne went for her regular checkup with the physiotherapist at Stoke Mandeville.  We took the Zimmer Frame and crutches with us so that we could return them because Yvonne is feeling quite stable on her feet now and would prefer to just use her walking stick for a bit of added support when she needs it.

The physiotherapist, Keith, was most impressed with the way she is walking and said she is making excellent progress.  He gave her a couple of new exercises that she should do daily to strengthen the muscles in her left leg where she had the operation.  She said that one of the exercises  was really difficult and very painful so Keith told her to listen to her body and do only as many repetitions as she felt she could handle without too much discomfort.  He was so impressed with her recovery that he has arranged for her next visit to be only next year on 6th January.  That will be 3 months after she had her operation and she should be pretty well back to normal.  She has been given an appointment to see the Specialist on 31st November for her first checkup and x-rays to make sure everything is settling in as it should and there is nothing out of place.

She is now permitted to drive but as yet she hasn't attempted it, but I'm sure she will handle it without any problem.

Yvonne's continuing recovery progress

On Monday 31st October Yvonne went to see the Physiotherapist at Stoke Mandeville Hospital for her regular checkup. The therapist Keith had her walking up and down the corridor to see how well she was progressing. He was very pleased with her progress and he has told her not to use her Zimmer Frame any more but to rather use a single crutch for a bit of support around the house. He also suggested that she occasionally try walking without any aids while indoors and to use 2 crutches when walking outdoors unless she feels she can cope comfortably with just the one crutch.

It is only 4 weeks since she had her hip replaced and she is now walking around with little or no aid at all. At times she says the muscles in her legs ache but they are getting stronger by the day. In a few weeks time she will be able to sleep on her side again, something she is looking forward to doing as she finds it terribly uncomfortable to sleep on her back all the time. In a couple of weeks she will be able to drive again so she won't have to rely on others to drive her around, which is something that has been very frustrating for her.

Yvonne's Pogress...

Day by day Yvonne has been continuing to make a steady recovery. On Monday 10th she went for her first physiotherapy session at Stoke Mandeville hospital. The physiotherapist, Keith, was very impressed with her progress and the extent of her flexibility so he added an extra knee-bend exercise to her daily routine.

On Friday 14th I took her to the Doctor's Rooms to have all the staples  removed from the incision in her thigh, a procedure that she really was not looking forward to. She had bad memories of having staples removed after an operation she had many years ago. When the Practice Nurse came into the room, the first thing Yvonne said to her was, "Do you you know how to take these staples out? Have you done this before?" The nurse assured her that it was  procedure that she had performed many times then Yvonne felt more relaxed and confident. The nurse was really expert at the removal and kept pausing after a more painful removal for Yvonne to take a breather and relax for a moment. The whole process took about 15 minutes and at the end of it Yvonne was so relieved and thankful that it hadn't been as bad as she had expected it to be.

Yvonne must now continue with her daily exercises to strengthen the muscles in her thighs and legs and to enhance the healing process. Day by day she is doing more and more but she gets frustrated that there are still many things she is ununable to do. As she gets her strength back and relies less on her walking frame she will be more mobile and she will be able to use her hands again.

The next milestone will be the visit to the physiotherapist at the end of the month.

Yvonne's Hip Replcement

On Monday 3rd October Yvonne went into High Wycombe Hospital to undergo a hip replacement operation on her left hip. She was admitted into the surgical unit at 11:30am and after some routine tests and preliminary checks she went into the operating theatre for her operation at 1:00pm. By 4:45pm it was all over and she was in Ward 12b starting out on her road to recovery. She went into theatre for a hip replacement and came out of theatre complaining that her eye was sore and felt like there was something lodged under the eyelid. She spent the first hour on the ward pestering the nursing staff to get her a cup of tea. She was permitted a cup of tea after she had been out of Recovery for an hour then she felt much better except for the irritation in her eye.

On the Tuesday she was allowed to get out of bed and sit in a chair for a few hours. The physiotherapist had her doing leg exercises and teaching her to get in and out of bed on her own. The Consultant who performed the operation was very pleased with the way the procedure progressed and said it was a very uneventful and routine operation. Over the next couple of days in hospital Yvonne continued to make great progress and she was discharged late Thursday afternoon.

Yvonne's first walkabout

Since she has been back home she has continued to make good progress and has been walking around our bungalow with the aid of a walking frame. She now wants to go for a little walk outdoors to get some fresh air. She is not experiencing much pain at all which is the one thing that she was most concerned about before she went into hospital. If she continues to make such good progress she will be back to her normal self and walking completely normally before Christmas.
Saturday 8th Oct 2011 - Yvonne's 2nd day at home and she is going walkabout already!!! I can see that I am not going to be able to keep Yvonne in one place for very long. It won't be many more weeks before she is out shopping again :-)

Our New Ford Focus

Having received a phone call from the salesman that sold us the Vauxhall Astra suggesting that we could upgrade our car for about the same monthly repayments so we went over to Perry's in Bletchley to look and see what cars they had available. We had a good look around the car lot and picked out a few cars that we would consider. Yvonne spotted a Vauxhall Zafira 2.2 7-seater which was a very nice bright metalic blue which was in our price range. I must admit it was a very nice car but we couldn't justify the expense of higher insurance and running costs. Yvonne got the salesman to unlock the car so that she could just sit in it for a few minutes. We looked at a few other Vauxhalls and Ford Focuses before deciding on a choice of another Vauxhall Astra or a Ford Focus 1.6 Estate. The Vauxhall was a 2004 model and the Ford was a 2006 model. We finally settled on the Ford as it ticked all the boxes for us.
It is a 2006 Ford Focus 1.6 Zetec Estate 5 door in light blue with only 28000 miles on the clock. It has an automatic/manual gearbox which suits both Yvonne and me. It has Antilock Brakes, Anti-Theft Device, Electric Mirrors, Fog Spot Lamps, Immobiliser, Power Steering, Trip Computer, Side Airbags and Steering Wheel Audio Controls. The car is in very good condition and has been very well looked after. The interior is well laid out and the seats are very comfortable. Perry's gave us a good trade-in on our Vauxhall Astra and they also gave us 6 months road tax in the deal. We are picking the car up on Friday 20th Feb 2009 so we will be riding in style as from this weekend.

Cooker Hood

Richard came around to our place and installed the new cooker hood that Yvonne bought on eBay for £45.
It has made such a difference. Now there are no cooking smells wafting through into the house. It has built-in lights so it illuminates the hob area of the stove.