GENERAL WELL-BEING

It is so important to look after yourself especially at the start of this process as nothing quite prepares you for how you will feel and the sense of self that you lose.  Depending on your reason for the Ilizarov there may be different factors at the start of your recovery that make you feel a certain way.  Personally, I suffered a trauma from the car accident so I had to deal with that at the start. 

​

Little things made a big difference to feeling myself again, doing the online food shopping made me feel that I was contributing to my family.  I also set up a little station at the side of my bed with a mirror, make up, creams, perfume, deodrant etc so I had easy access to everything and could do things independantly.

​

Giving myself another focus helped as well, starting up an instagram page and creating this website was a good distraction.  I also noted down, just in my phone, how I was feeling each day.  Looking back on it you can see how far you have come.

​

​

EXERCISE

Now when I say exercise I mean getting up and about and taking the lead from your physio on exercising.    The NHS say that you can't walk too much and you must let the frame take the strain which is easy to say and much harder to put into action!  After 6 weeks I was told I had made no improvement as I wasn't weight bearing enough.  I then worked so hard on getting off my crutches through walking around the house, going from 2 crutches, to one crutch to none at all.  Shifting weight from one foot to the other when doing things like the washing up and cooking.  After another 6 weeks I was told my frame could be removed so it definitely pays to push yourself.

One thing that really motivated me was getting a fitbit (or in my case a cheap alternative called Mi Band from Amazon for £25)!  I mainly use it to track my steps each day which motivates me when I achieve a higher number of steps.  I also set it to vibrate every hour if I haven't moved.

​

​

SLEEPING

Sleeping was the part of this process I was worried about but I have actually slept pretty well since leaving hospital and being back home.  The best thing I did was purchase a leg support pillow which I bought from amazon for around £50 (pictured below).  The incline of the pillow meant my knees were bent which I read could cause knee issues so I used a normal pillow between my bum and the support pillow which just helped the incline and meant my legs were a lot more straight.

​    Having my legs in the air helped with the swelling and is also good for your circulation.  To start with I had to get used to sleeping on my back in this position and not moving all night but my body quickly adapted.  I also found wearing my hospital shoe at night helped to support my foot.

I also found it helped to wear socks and wrapped my frame in a blanket to keep warm as insulation is important (see below) and I also used a sleep spray on my pillow which helped me to relax in the evenings.

​

​

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

WASHING

So there are different bits of advice on getting the frame wet.  Some sites you will find say its ok to shower the frame, others say that it is ok to get it wet just before a clean (which I was asked to do once a week).  I decided to just not get it wet at all.

​     First week for me was tough as I had no energy at all so I would have my mum or husband help me with a bed wash which surprisingly made me feel very refreshed.  I had my first shower on week 4 and it was the best day!  The freedom of doing it myself just felt amazing!  We bought a bath board off amazon which works perfectly as we have a shower over the bath so I am able to sit on the board with my good leg in the bath and my bad leg out covered with a towel and I held the shower.  I also used a small step that my children use to reach the sink to prop my leg onto.

​

​

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

INSULATION

It is also important to insulate the frame in the winter as the frame gets cold and therefore so do your bones!  Same can be said with heat as well.  At night time I wrap a fairly thin blanket around my frame and foot to keep it warm.  I also found that sharing a duvet with my husband was slightly annoying as he would steal some of the covers which would wake me and once you are awake you are aware of your frame so drifting back to sleep can be tough.  So now I sleep with a single duvet which has helped.

​The best idea I found (and this is great if you have kids) I recycled one of son's sleep bags!  It fits perfectly around the frame, its fully lined and zips up.  Plus they come in lovely patterns and colours!

​

​

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

GETTING AROUND

Get a wheelchair!  The doctors didn't mention this to me in the hospital probably because they want to make sure you are up and about as much as possible but you need to get fresh air and for me being a mum I needed to get out with my family. 

 

I ordered a wheelchair from Ebay which cost £75 and then I ordered a leg elevator separately which cost £35 from Amazon.  You can pay out a lot for wheelchairs so do make sure you look into it.  The leg elevator we ordered wasn't compatible with the wheelchair so we had to get inventive with getting it fixed to it! 

Please also bear in mind that wheelchairs take up a lot of room in the car boot so factor that in when going out especially if you have buggies, scooters etc

​

​

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

CLEANING

Cleaning your pin sites is so important to avoid infection, I am sure this has been drilled into you from the start.  When you clean your sites make sure you have everything laid out and ready especially if doing it on your own.  Everything you need you can get on prescription apart from the disclips you are sent home with (although not everyone will have the same). The disclips (pictured below in red) are great for keeping your dressings in place, although they are very stiff to clip on and off and can snap.  Don't be scared though to give it a good push on your pin it won't hurt you.  I managed to get more disclips from a lovely lady on the Facebook support group (details on support tab).

When cleaning I picked up a tip which was great and that was to wrap each pin site in the soaked gauze and leave for 10-15 minutes and this helps to soothe them.  Also, if you have had quite a bit of bleeding at any of the sites the dressing pads can get stuck so putting the soaked gauze over the pad and leaving for anywhere up to an hour it will help the pad away from the skin without ripping at the scab.  Scabs are good so leave the scab!

​

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

SKIN CARE

I found my foot on my bad leg got very dry as well as the skin on my leg.  It really made me feel better to take the time to pedicure my feet (or have someone else do it).  On my leg I would use olive oil on a cotton pad to help with the dryness.

​

I also found that due to the medication my scalp also got very dry so using head and shoulders (or an Aldi look-a-like) helped to ease this

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

FASHION
Everybody is different with how they want to dress but for me I didn't just want to cut up a pair of joggers to get over my frame, I still wanted to feel nice especially as I knew I would be going back to work.  Wide leg trousers work wonders and I ended up ordering a load to find the right ones.  The best material I found was Plisse which had loads of stretch.  Shops like H&M and Primark did a lot of styles and colours at a good price.  I also purchased a few maxi dresses from SilkFred.

I also wore slipper socks around the house with grip on the bottom, as I had 4 heel pins and a foot ring I couldn't get the sock on properly but I found some socks that were a trainer sock shape which I could just hook on the back of my heel.

​

​

​

​

​