Material Girl

We went out today for breakfast and groceries, my second time doing this since my surgery almost three weeks ago. One thing that tends to happen when I do the “normal Saturday errand” thing is that my enthusiasm for getting out and about becomes mismatched to my body’s desire to keep up. Now, having done this through all seasons, I can say a day filled with Canadian wildfire smoke and high temps is a bit tougher to manage on crutches. But I’ve learned a few things that are important to keep in mind.

First, I’ve found it’s vital to have a plan and stick to it. Breakfast eaten out is mandatory once a week, and honestly, it’s one of the biggest treats of my week. Who doesn’t love fresh French toast with bananas and real maple syrup?! I’m of the mindset that you really need to get out of the house on a semi-regular basis during this long recovery, if at all possible.

Then it’s two grocery stores, same as always, but making my other half do the actual shopping. My job is to crutch along and tell him what to grab from the shelves. And then home. Because honestly that is pretty tiring, and the foot and ankle start to get angry from the blood flow. At this point, I can do an hour or so here and there before I have to prop it back up and let the tissue settle. Even when the stitches come out there will be swelling for months, especially once I become weight-bearing. We have a concert next month and I’ll be crutching it, sitting in the handicap section, even if I’m out of the boot by then (spoiler alert: I won’t be).

Finally, I found a few things that make being mobile easier, and I created an Amazon list for them. I’ve talked about a few of these already, but some items are worth pointing out:

• Replacement cam walker — hello, comfort. This was discussed a few days ago, and it’s definitely protecting without strangling.
• Knee scooter — I sort of thought I’d use this one more, but right now the only thing I can think of outside would be to scooter up the street to the farmers’ market, and it’s just too damn hot for that. So it stays indoors and helps move me around the kitchen while I get dinner prepped.
• iWalk — ohhhhh, my favorite. Fun fact: I iWalked almost 3/4 of a mile on this when we went to Hawaii back in 2017, three weeks post-surgery. We’d ridden the trolley to a nearby food and mall area and had way too many mai tais. Then, still parked at the bar, we decided it was such a nice evening that we should walk back to the hotel and admire the sunset. We could have just kept watching the sun go down and cabbed it back like sensible people, but the alcohol won that argument — hence the 3/4-mile iWalk. That was a bad idea, but the iWalk is still my favorite. I’m just not fast on it, so it too tends to stay home, where it lets me get up and down the stairs easier and do things that need my hands: laundry, cooking, and the like.
• Rain guard crutch tips — THESE ARE AN ABSOLUTE MUST-HAVE. They helped me in rain, snow, and everything in between. Standard crutch tips are awful on wet surfaces — you WILL fall — so if you must be on crutches for any length of time, pop those default ones off and replace them with these. Mine have been on my crutches since 2016. Yes, the same pair of “lucky crutches.” Maybe I need to rethink that moniker, now that I think about it…

After getting home and unpacking groceries, I was wiped out and my leg was angry. There’s absolutely no reason to skip a 10:30 a.m. nap, so I didn’t. Turns out the material girl also needs her beauty sleep — and the boxes on the porch will still be there when I wake up.