Today I made my return to cycling following appendix surgery. I opted for the turbo trainer, the logic being that if I felt any pain I could stop straight away. I had been advised by the surgeon to give it 2 weeks before returning to ‘normal duties’ and this felt about right for making a return to light cycling. It still feels a bit soon to be running or heavy lifting but I thought an easy spin on the bike would be good for the body and mind. It’s been surprising how quickly my body has recovered from the op. If I’d had open surgery rather than keyhole, my recovery period would have been far longer. This is an approximate timeline:
Day 1 – Recovery in hospital. Immediately following surgery, the acute pain to my abdomen disappeared. A constant supply of strong drugs eased the pain of surgery and I was discharged from hospital that evening.
Days 2 – 5 : Recovery at home. Mostly laying in bed taking painkillers and antibiotics and watching old DVDs.
Days 5 – 7 : Moving around the house with minimal discomfort. I stopped taking the strong painkillers and tried to be guided by my body. If I felt any pain or discomfort I stopped whatever it was that I was doing and rested.
Days 7 – 10 : Returned to light duties. No pain from the abdomen area. Soreness from the incisions, particularly the central one. This was possibly from clothing rubbing on the hardening scar. I used ‘Bio Oil’ and did some light massaging of the scar at the recommendation of my wife who’d had a caesarean last year. It should be pointed out that the level of sympathy I was receiving at this stage from Mrs BikeVCar was understandably hovering between minimal and none. “Pffft, Call that a scar?!”
Days 11 – 13 : Feeling back to normal. Going about my normal day but resisting the urge to exercise.
Day 14 : Did an easy 30 minutes on the turbo trainer. It’s been quite cold and wet recently so despite my normal reluctance to use the turbo, today it seemed preferable to stay indoors.
Looking ahead I plan to take another week or two of light exercise before doing anything more strenuous to ensure I’m fully healed. It’s probably the best time of year to have something like this happen. With the short days and grim weather I don’t feel like I’m missing too much at the moment. Roll on Spring …
Sweat and sawdust mingling on the workshop floor
People keep telling me to take it easy so I will pass that advice on. Better to err on the side of caution.
One of my main goals for 2015 is to try and stay injury free. So will definitely be pacing myself. Not sure how that’s going to work with ‘Bike v Car’!
Welcome back brother. Glad the recovery is going well.
How things change. I had appendicitis as a child 27 years ago and I wasn’t allowed to exercise at all for 5 weeks! I don’t know if keyhole surgery had been invented then, but if it had, I wasn’t given it. I didn’t mind too much though – all that time off school, lounging around in the sun and eating a never ending supply of ‘get well chocolates’ 🙂
I’m not sure when they started keyhole surgery but with open surgery it’s definitely a much longer recovery. Luckily there was still a lot of xmas chocolate hanging around the house for my week in bed.
Glad to hear your recovery is going well – keep it easy and don’t push yourself. You’ll soon realise when the pain has gone completely just from your regular day to day movement – you’ll stretch and realise ‘oh, that hurts’ or ‘oh, that doesn’t hurt anymore’! Or from banging/catching it on something (happens no matter how careful!).
As mentioned – perfect time for it to happen! I’m actually avoiding commuting while these roads are frozen – thankfully it’s tied into me starting on trainerroad for some structure on the turbo! 😉
That’s definitely wise to avoid the frozen roads on a bike. I tried going for a run this morning and even had to abandon that due to ice. Not worth taking that sort of risk. Last time I came off the bike on ice I was going pretty slow and it still made a mess of my knee, hip and bike.
Wishing you a speedy recovery!