The time may come when you are plagued with over-lap autoimmune disorders and your joints are just done! Keeping your organs clean and fresh is a must because those are a little harder to replace. You can live a nice clean life and keep your organs on a great balance. But, the joints go through a certain number of rotations with activity a day no matter what. As a result, if your a very active person you put those joints through many more rotations daily. Thus, this is going to wear all the tissue surrounding the bone, and the bone itself out quicker! Surviving a 2nd hip replacement might be the only option.
Please remember, I am giving you my perspective on this whole process with my 30 + year nursing career knowledge. You always need to have a good working relationship with a knowledgeable physician and listen to their recommendations. After having one hip replaced, the thought of surviving a 2nd hip replacement is overwhelming.
Why replace a 2nd hip?
Usually, with autoimmune damage on your joints it is considered a elective procedure. Unlike, having a fracture making it more emergent obviously. What I found within myself was, after the first hip repair the second hip was dragging me down. It couldn’t keep up with my new hip anymore. I had to ice the old one once again at night to stop the continuous throbbing/stabbing pain.
This raises the question of how soon can you get a 2nd hip replacement done? The doctor I worked with had done them as early as 5 weeks in between. The actual condition of what you are dealing with in personal bone/joint health is a factor as well no doubt.
Personally, for me, the question of why would you do that was clear. I wanted to be able to regain my sense of freedom, freedom of movement. My diseased hip was getting in the way now of my progress back to better health. The big question was could I face the pain and survive this 2nd hip replacement in under 2 months of the first one. This also means going through all the covid screening and quarantines necessary to get there again.
Get Ready for surviving a 2nd hip replacement
In my life, I have been lucky enough to be able to purchase a swim spa for my home and a enclosure around it. Being extremely knowledgeable in the importance of exercise and the over all health of the body is one of my degree’s & forte’s. Feeling the over all aches and pains in my body now, and losing abilities is overwhelming. The answer for exercise in people like myself is, pool therapy. It’s non weight bearing, giving your body a chance to stretch, move, and exercise without the pressure on the joints.
Endless pool Swim spa. 15 Feet by 8 feet.
I had been working on getting this pool set up for well over a year, it didn’t come easy. We are deep into all these covid complications which affects everything. It was 4 months before I could even get the tub, I wanted to buy American. This time frame messed me up for getting any exercise before the first hip replacement. I was finally able to swim 3 weeks after the first hip. I was able to get in 5 weeks of swimming before the second hip. It was a gradual build up to swimming, exercising, and stretching for 30 minutes daily.
There is really not a lot of other things you can do to prepare for a second hip. Possibly get a raised toilet set, and make sure all your house work is up to date. Meaning, laundry and maybe some meals you can put in the freezer ahead of time. It will be apparent by the end of this post, the best thing to prepare yourself is being on, and consistently exercising those muscles. I believe it was the main factor in helping me survive this 2nd hip replacement surgery.
Ready to survive your 2nd hip replacement
Surprisingly I only had to wait 2 weeks from my phone call, to get the 2nd hip replaced. Not much time to get more of my new swim exercise program in. They had the usual nasal swabs for MRSA & staff infections, then the lovely dig your brain out Covid testing. A bunch of blood studies to make sure you are still healthy enough to survive a major surgery!
The day is finally here and you take your walker with you for round two. If you can make it and pass all their criteria, your chances of going home that same day are pretty good. This requires in my case a early morning drive, since the hospital is 1 1/2 hours away.
Pre-op is ready for you!
It was the same routine for pre-op as last time, with exception of different staff people. The anesthesia was done the same, with a slight change in the time things went black. This time I was able to move over to the table with assistance. I watched the nurses put my leg in the knee support and boot support. Seeing this made me realize why I had such pain and bruising in those areas post op.
Boom!, I am out, next thing I remember is being wheeled into the recovery room. Took me an hour to get to the orthopedic floor. Ordered some food, yum!, and waited for more feeling to come back in my legs. It took about an hour, and the urge to urinate was there. Not wanting to upset the nurses I get them to assist me for the first time up, which is basically just watching me. Passing another one of their criteria, I might beat my discharge time from the first hip repair. Finally, I feel I have survived this 2nd hip replacement.
Lets get out of here!
Sitting there wide awake, I just want to get dressed. I have a hep lock in, or just a pigtail I.V., so my bag of clothes is calling to me. I am amazed at how much easier I am able to move around this time, actually unbelievable. Being smarter I just brought crocs to slip on my feet big enough to support the hospital socks. I dressed myself with ease and sat and watched tik-tok for distractions. A few more of those criteria’s to meet, and freedom would be mine.
Since the nurse was a bit shocked I was dressed already in under 2 hours, she was on the horn for P.T. to come see me which was great! P.T. came around and I had the usual walk around the ward floor to the fake stairs I had to go up and down. Doing the stairs and walking was a breeze. In fact, the couple nurses standing at the end of the hallway saw us coming and just grew silent, with a Wow!, your doing great. Now a few more of those boxes to check off.
Almost there!
O.T. was suppose to watch me dress I guess, so she basically just asked alot of questions about home environment and made me touch my toes. I almost burst out laughing wondering if she though I had a hidden gremlin in the closet come out and dress me.
All I needed was the resident PA, to sign my papers and I can call my hubs to pick me up at the door. Finally, sprung with the leg being a little ouchy. Leaving was a weird trip, nobody anywhere in the place. It was mid afternoon. Right now if you decide to get a elective, that is the way it is in the year of the covid. You also have to be prepared for not having a loved one with you, they have to wait in the car or be within a calling distance. You will need the support of someone to help you in surviving a 2nd hip replacement.
Still surviving a 2nd hip replacement in 2021
It is day number 7 post op from the hip replacement. It seems this one is soooooooo much easier. None of the real severe pain that you can’t even move kinda of stuff. Oh, there is pain there alright but the ease of moving with it sure seems much easier. The only thing that has changed in this scenerio is my 5 weeks of swim therapy before this 2nd hip replacement.
What the program included was swim to failure (did’t take much for me), with active exercises on entire body in between for 30 minutes a day. I worked up the length of swimming and intensity as I went day to day. There was only 3 days in 5 weeks that had been missed. I was able to do at 1 week, what I did at 4 weeks on the first hip.
Now, I can’t say it was because of the exercise——–Oh, yeah probably. But when I see my Doc next week I am going to ask him if he concurs with my observation. Every one has different circumstances so you have to be smart about what you do to your body and always listen to your healthcare professionals. I hope this post can give you some insight into what it takes to survive a 2nd hip replacement.
Please contact me at links provided if any questions or comments! Check out my other link which describes auto immune issues: What is overlapping autoimmune disorders, how do you live with them. (diys-by-dar.com). Also going through a first hip replacement from my perspective: Getting a new hip replacement for Functionality in your life (diys-by-dar.com)
