Any cyborgs? Or long-term invalids?

[EditorOne]

OK, I'm using the term "cyborg" loosely, but I'm finally getting my bad knee, about which I have surely complained in here, totally replaced. In addition to having to declare and explain my chromium/cobalt component at airport screening checkpoints from here on out, I'll be pretty much helpless for two weeks and vastly limited for six weeks after that. I'm wondering if anyone else in here has had to experience a prolonged period of dependency and if so what I can expect.
I am not comfortable with the idea of receiving help. I'm usually the one giving it. Fortunately the one I'm going to be most dependent on is my wife; as a footnote, my knee is getting done only because she finally got stimulator implants in her head that have knocked back her migraine pain, after a dozen years of it getting worse. She will soon be able to drive, and I won't, a reversal of roles that had settled in over the last two years when she was getting worse and worse.

Anyway any insights appreciated.

 

[Ex-User (5841)]

Well, I'm not a cyborg or an invalid yet, but I see no one else has responded. (Maybe the borgs and invalids aren't able? )

Do you think this will ultimately give you (plural) more freedom and strengthen your relationship? (Not that it isn't already strong, but it can always get stronger, right?)

I'd expect an initial wave of ignorance from people who've gotten to know your independent ways and developed a sort of social expectation from you. You and/or your wife may be bothered with a lot of explaining and updating. Being attended by a nurse can also be weird if you've never had an extended stay equipped with aided bathing and bodily waste excretion.

How long has it been since she's driven? I'm not sure if driving is anywhere close to never forgetting how to ride a bike.

Otherwise... Prepare to read a lot, enjoy the painkillers, sweatpants >>>>>>> jeans, do ALL the rehab work, and invest in a bitchin' cane?

*EDIT: Oh, and laugh.

 

[crippli]

machines are the future, Humanity brings but pain.

 

[Ex-User (9062)]

All i can say is: good luck and get well soon.
Also pay close attention to physiotherapeutical aftercare.

 

[EditorOne]

I should change my avatar to Gregory House for a few months. "I don't have a drug problem, I have a pain problem!"

 

[Oedipus]

My dad had both his hips replaced over the course of two years not long ago. He doesn't like being stuck in the house at all so he wasn't much of a fan. Especially being stuck in bed while he was still in hospital. He was very pleased when he could walk down the dirt path from our house to the pub after a week or so. He was kind of very defiant about taking it easy, though. He basically started taking long walks as soon as he possibly could to try to start building up the muscle they had to slice through again. The only real complication was the fault of a nurse who took some fluid which had built up around his knee out with a dirty needle—we went on holiday to Morocco a couple weeks after that, when it suddenly became abundantly clear that it was infected. Within a few days it was smelling of rotten meat and it was really really red and swollen, and so much shit was leaking out of it it wasn't even funny. The Moroccan doctors wanted him to go back to Britain right away but he stayed for the rest of the holiday and when he got back they almost had to amputate it at the hip. So, like, good one, dad. After that, though, it was much better. He has scoliosis which is what fucked up his hips, and after they had healed up (about half a year-a year after each operation) he was in so so so much less pain than he had been in for years, and it made a lot of a difference. He was basically much less of a dick after because he wasn't grumpy from being in pain all the time. So overall he's pretty glad he got it done.
That's basically all I know.

 

[EditorOne]

"That's basically all I know."

That's basically a lot. Thanks!