March 11th - I RODE A BIKE!!!

So PT started today and best part of the story is I RODE A BIKE!  Yes, for 8 minutes I was pedaling a stationary bike under my own power.  I don't care that in that 8 minutes I covered a whole .1 mile (yeah there is a point in front of the 1) at a cadence of 17rpm and burned 10 calories.  The point is I RODE A BIKE!

Here's a recap of the best day that I have had since the day of surgery.  Dad headed home today.  It was great to have him here and it was a huge help.  I have a better understanding of those who pay others to cut their grass and change their oil...too bad I'm way to cheap for that to ever happen.  Since PT started today, I also decided that I needed to get back into some sort of workout routine.  Along with the quad strength and stability exercises I found that my knee tolerates pull-ups, core work and modified push-ups pretty well.  It has been over a month since I did any kind of physical activity so I decided to start small.  Here's what I did on my own after I borrowed a bench from the weight room at school:

pull-ups - 4x10
core work - 5x15
modified bench push ups - 4x10 

Then it was time for PT.  I have decided to go to ProHealth Physical Therapy and Pilates Studio in Peachtree City.  The therapist is nationally recognized, published in numerous Pilates publications and is called on to present at many orthopedic associations.  She is also known for pushing her patients very hard to reach the desired result.  I should note that one of first questions she asked was "what is the stationary bike situation at your house?...because I'm going to need you to be riding 15 minutes a day from now on."  I was almost speechless at that point.  After the initial evaluation and taking a few measurements, we got right to the exercises.  It was pretty cool to see how much my range of motion improved just from a few new exercises.  After showing me the rest of the exercises she put me on the stationary bike for 8 minutes.  The pain on the first pedal stroke was pretty intense, but as I continued it subsided a bit.  For the record, I took 3 ibuprofen as soon as I got home.  All in all I got 4 new exercises, she told me to end a couple of the old ones AND she told me I can ditch the crutches.  I do have to keep the brace for a while for stability, especially when I do my own workouts.  Today was definitely a good day, and I will be back at PT tomorrow at 10am for more punishment.  Bring it.