torn acl

[Eng4WorldCup]

anyone else had a torn acl? i just found out mine is torn. is it a rough recovery time?

 

[Toddtherod]

ya I tore mine during a camp last summer. My knee swelled up like a watermelon for a while and I couldn't bend my leg but the pain wasn't to unbearable or anything during the recovery.

 

[Jambo Den]

I've done mine on my right leg playing and just did my medial on my left peg recently. Came from dislocating my kneecap, which ended up at nearly my hamstring muscle at the back of my leg!

Now, I can't stress how important it is to leave your leg as straight as you possibly can during recovery. If you have it slightly flexed, the ligaments will grow back that bit longer, leaving your leg very, very unstable when you put weight on it. You may literally have to concentrate taking steps/running! Which is so frustrating and risky that some have actually given up playing at any level like myself.

Are you needing an operation to repair the ligaments? It varies greatly on how badly it's done in. But, whatever your doctor tells you at the hospital on how long you'd be out for, add on around 2/3 months to the recovery (getitng fitness back up, readjusting to ball control, etc.)

If you can tense up your quad muscles in your thigh during recovery, that will help a lot.

 

[Socrates]

I tore my ACL, MCL, and a bunch of cartilage back in November while playing indoor soccer and got surgery in Decemeber. I am now playing but not like I use too, its still pretty bad. When I do certain things my knee really hurts...but thats because I injured it again after only 3 months of surgey...I thought my knee was strong and tried to play a little bit but injured it a litte bit. Did some more damage on my knee. Jambo Den covered it pretty well, make sure you keep your knee stright and dont play untill instruced to do so. Recovery is a bitch btw, it takes so long to heal and it just sucks.

 

[Eng4WorldCup]

the problem i have though is that it didnt swell up. it just hurt like hell a fewtimes that i played then i went to the doctor. first doctor said its torn (the mri said fully torn) but when i went to him he said it may be slightly torn or stretched and not fully torn. he told me that i can play here and there with a knee brace but at any point i can pop it and it can get torn fully. then i went to another doctor (who is official doctor for the yankees) and he said its torn and that i should do surgery. so now what the hell to do? is it possible its fully torn but it didnt swell up? it may have swelled up very very slightly (unseeable difference to the other knee).

 

[Socrates]

the problem i have though is that it didnt swell up. it just hurt like hell a fewtimes that i played then i went to the doctor. first doctor said its torn (the mri said fully torn) but when i went to him he said it may be slightly torn or stretched and not fully torn. he told me that i can play here and there with a knee brace but at any point i can pop it and it can get torn fully. then i went to another doctor (who is official doctor for the yankees) and he said its torn and that i should do surgery. so now what the hell to do? is it possible its fully torn but it didnt swell up? it may have swelled up very very slightly (unseeable difference to the other knee).

Damn, if it did not swell up than your lucky. Mine had swell up pretty bad and I had to wait like a month befoe I could get surgery. It seems like your doctor's are trying to confuse you, if your ACL really is fully torn ( If that what your mri says ) than you will have to get surgery as you cant play on a torn ACL ( Well some people can...maybe your one of them you lucky bastard as least thats what my physical therapist told me ). Well first I would find out what the hell is going on and why your doctors are saying two different things and than I would follow their advice which will most likely be surgery.

Have you actually tried to play yet? Damn I couldn't do **** until 2-3 months after surgery.

 

[Eng4WorldCup]

i can run, but i cant be agressive at all... well both doctors at first said that its fully torn, the first one also said i can play on it but with a knee brace but i should know that if i get hit or something happens then ill know its fully done.... how bad is the knee brace? is it huge and annoying??

 

[Limberopoulos21]

If I were you I wouldn't be playing on it since you'll probably worsen it. Just wait until you fully recovered.

 

[Socrates]

i can run, but i cant be agressive at all... well both doctors at first said that its fully torn, the first one also said i can play on it but with a knee brace but i should know that if i get hit or something happens then ill know its fully done.... how bad is the knee brace? is it huge and annoying??

The knee brace you have to wear while playing is not that big but it sure as hell is annoying. It goes down 4 inchs and up 4 inches from the center of your knee so, it has to be put on tight so it really bugs me when I play.

As for the other thing they will put on your leg...it covers the whole leg from the thigh to the ankle...yea its ******* big. It helps though because it locks up your knee so it wont bend at all/they can put it at a certain degree so you cant bend it too much.

I would advise you not to play at the moment, no one really even has to touch you to make it worse. Look at Owens injury...yea you see how his knee ****ed up there? That could happen to you aswell. If your running I dont think its too bad of a tear? Maybe you can just go to physical teraphy and just heal that way. You will be out for some time though even if you dont get surgery.

Anyways, good luck on your recovery and hopefully you knee gets back to normal.

 

[Eng4WorldCup]

yankees doctor says i should go ahead an operate. he took a look at the mri and said its fully torn... thats that then

gotta do it when i have free time though so its gonna be another 4-5 months till i do it.

 

[Socrates]

yankees doctor says i should go ahead an operate. he took a look at the mri and said its fully torn... thats that then

gotta do it when i have free time though so its gonna be another 4-5 months till i do it.

Wow thats a bit of a long time? Do you plan on playing soccer again? because you will be out for more than a year if you wait that long for sergery. Recovery takes 6-8 months so thats quite a wait there. I have mine after a moth and a half of tearing it.

 

[Eng4WorldCup]

Wow thats a bit of a long time? Do you plan on playing soccer again? because you will be out for more than a year if you wait that long for sergery. Recovery takes 6-8 months so thats quite a wait there. I have mine after a moth and a half of tearing it.

i do plan on playing again but i cant do the surgery now. considering ill be out of any action (going places) for around a month after surgery, in 2 weeks is my cousins wedding. then college starts and there is no brake until decemeber - which is when i plan to do it. obviously from now i'd be out around a year but theres not much i can do about that. as long as it becomes just as strong if not stronger then ill be fine for next year soccer... im a champion in my community and school, im nt worried about a long layoff and playing again, im just worried about the strength of my knee after. mentally im all positive.
how long after the surgery could you start walking? and from surgery did you have to take any pain killers or anything? also, did u do the patellar tendon surgery? if so, does your kneecap occasionally hurt now or its fine?

 

[Socrates]

i do plan on playing again but i cant do the surgery now. considering ill be out of any action (going places) for around a month after surgery, in 2 weeks is my cousins wedding. then college starts and there is no brake until decemeber - which is when i plan to do it. obviously from now i'd be out around a year but theres not much i can do about that. as long as it becomes just as strong if not stronger then ill be fine for next year soccer... im a champion in my community and school, im nt worried about a long layoff and playing again, im just worried about the strength of my knee after. mentally im all positive.
how long after the surgery could you start walking? and from surgery did you have to take any pain killers or anything? also, did u do the patellar tendon surgery? if so, does your kneecap occasionally hurt now or its fine?

I see good to see that, If the surgery and rehab goes right your knee should be stronger than before it tore.

If I remember right it took me 3 or 4 days to walk. Its not the walking thats really hard but being able to bend your knee so you can do the normal stuff is what is hard. ( your supposed to keep your knee stirght untill they start your rehab which will start the bending process ). Yes I had pain killers, I took them after the block on my leg was gone. For me first they just more or less numbed it all on my right leg so that when I got up from surgery I would not have pain. I did have a bad reactin to the meds that they had me on so I had to stay overnight but usually they let you out the same day of surgery.

I had the hamstring one, not sure what its called. They go in and get the legimint from your hamestring, not sure if thats what your talking about? No my kneecap does not hurt and there is only a small scar there. The only reason I still have pain/problems with my knee is because I tired to come back earlier than 6 months and trust me thats a really bad idea. So I do have pain at times when I play but its getting better day by day so I should be fine without having to do another surgery on it.

 

[Eng4WorldCup]

the hamstring one is different. the hamstring one is taken from the hamstring, but the one the doctor wants to do to me (and it the only one he does) is the patellar one which its take from the patellar (front of your knee), which is why i ask if it hurts because they say sometimes the knee cap hurts...

so of course theres no way im gonna risk my future so i wont play until they say im 100% ready. i once had a different surgery which i was supposed to be out for 3 weeks only but i took off 2 months just to make sure...

were u on crutches at all? wat did u do the first week or two after the surgery

 

[Socrates]

the hamstring one is different. the hamstring one is taken from the hamstring, but the one the doctor wants to do to me (and it the only one he does) is the patellar one which its take from the patellar (front of your knee), which is why i ask if it hurts because they say sometimes the knee cap hurts...

so of course theres no way im gonna risk my future so i wont play until they say im 100% ready. i once had a different surgery which i was supposed to be out for 3 weeks only but i took off 2 months just to make sure...

were u on crutches at all? wat did u do the first week or two after the surgery

Hmm well I had the other surgery and I dont feel any pain from my kneecap, cant say about the surgery your talking about. Maybe someone else here can.

Yes I was on crutches but not for long, like I said I was walking fast just not bending it right so its actually easier to go with crutches because they want you to keep the knee stright untill the rehab starts than you start the bending and all that other good stuff. What did I do, nothing much just rested and did my exercies that I got from my physical therapist.

Its really not too bad, just the 6 months out of soccer really sucks otherwise after 2 months I was running on the treadmill and all.

 

[Eng4WorldCup]

sounds good. thanks alot for helping me out. it really has calm me down now that i see how other people went through it. when it first happened i was really pissed cuz i thought i couldnt play again, so being able to play in 9-10 months from now is certainly something im happy about.

 

[Socrates]

sounds good. thanks alot for helping me out. it really has calm me down now that i see how other people went through it. when it first happened i was really pissed cuz i thought i couldnt play again, so being able to play in 9-10 months from now is certainly something im happy about.

Yea no problem, at first I thought it was nothing. I was limping off the field and was expecting it to be fine in 1 week. The next day I realized that something was really ****ed up but never did I expect it to be as bad as it turned out.

When the doctor first told me I would be out for 6-8-12 months I was shocked than I just got really angrey about it. I never had a serious injury before either.

Yea dont worry about it too much, its not too bad and you will be out there again.

 

[Eng4WorldCup]

just to let you guys know im doing it mid december. im supposed to start physical therapy soon to strengthen it before the surgery to cut down the time it takes to re strengthen my legs.

here we go...

 

[ShearerM4]

It seems to be a very common thing at that age, around 20 to 23 (I'm guessing you're around that age).

I did my knee over two years ago, just before euro2004... and because of my studies couldnt have the operation. So i went two years without it (haven't played competitive football since then) and finally had it done last June, so I'm 5 months in now.

Anyway, you're in for a tough month at the very start, but after that if you're determined enough it should pretty much be plain sailing. Just be careful what you eat, as you can easily put on weight depnding on your metabolism.

You shouldnt really be running on it at all until about 4-5 months, even then start with stable stuff (like treadmills at first idealy). Seeing as you didn't seem to have the total crunching of the knee experience, and from what I briefly read it didnt swell up too much at first, that's already a good start.

edit: just realised how old this topic was!

 

[Eng4WorldCup]

its all good, more advice is welcome.

well, my knee didnt swell up at all. later one of my moms friends (who is a physical therapist in england) told me that if i tear it a few times instead of one time then it doesnt swell up. i guess in a way its good but in another way its bad that i kept playing on it without getting it treated (to be fair it WAS my senior year and, being captain, i wanted to win the league - and i could have easily done it had i not had this injury)

can you tell me what exactly goes on around 1 month to 3 months after the op? do you still have something on your knee after the cruches stage? are you able to drive (its my right leg)?

and (lol) i know this sounds weird but one of my fears is taking a dump. itll be so uncomfortable right!