Support, Stories & Strength for Your Journey

It was only through my two knee replacements that I realized — my second time around, I was considerably calmer. And that's not to say I didn't have fear and anxiety. We're human, we process emotions. But I knew what surgery day would look like, and I also realized nobody really talks about the small stuff. So, I want to tell you about three things that actually caught me off guard both times and genuinely surprised me.Surprise #1: Prep Isn't About the Surgery. It's About Infection.My personality is pretty much “Perfect Patty”. So, when my facility handed me a list before surgery 

Three weeks before my first knee replacement, my husband proposed. I know that's not the opening you expected on a knee replacement blog. But stay with me, because that proposal ended up changing the entire way I approached my recovery, and it's the reason I want to share these three things with you today.Suddenly I wasn't just a woman getting a new knee. I was a bride-to-be picturing her wedding day, and I already knew exactly what I wanted to wear: 3 and a half inch heels. Which meant I already knew what my legs needed to be able to do. Strength training wasn't optional anymore. It had a purpose.

When I started prepping for my knee replacement, I did what everyone tells you to do. I went looking for the checklist. The list of gadgets, the list of must-haves, the list of "here's exactly what you need." The deeper I got into it, the more overwhelmed I felt, and the more I realized something wasn't sitting right with me.Those lists are built for a generic person. I'm not a generic person. I'm me, at my age, in my body, walking into my specific surgery. So instead of collecting more checklists, I stepped back and looked at the bigger picture instead of the small stuff.

Before my first knee replacement, I didn't prepare. I didn't plan. I just waited for the day to arrive, because by that point, my knee was so degraded that even stepping up a curb hurt. In all honesty, I just wanted to make it through the surgery and survive. I wasn’t thinking ahead. There were just over 3 years that passed between knee replacement #1 and knee replacement #2 and by my second knee replacement, I felt stronger and I recovered faster. And it came down to one thing I refused to skip the second time around.Knee Number One: Almost No Plan at All

Before my first knee replacement, I did what most people do. I started a list. Ice machine, grabber tool, wedge pillow, sock aid, all the gadgets that show up the second you search "knee replacement must haves." I thought these people must know because they’ve been through it. By my second knee replacement, my whole approach had changed. And it had nothing to do with what I could buy on Amazon.The Problem With "Buying" Your Way ReadyAfter two knee replacements, here's what I've come to believe. A checklist of products can make you feel prepared without actually preparing

Reflecting after both of my knee replacements, I can say that I was not the same person with number two that I was with number one. And because of that, my result was very different.My first one took the full six weeks to get my range of motion back. My second time, I had it back in a couple of weeks. Same body, same surgeon skill, so different outcomes. It took me a while to actually sit with why that was, and what I landed on was that it came down to what I did before I ever walked into the operating room.I get into all of it in this week's video — the three things I did the same both times, what I changed the second time, and the one thing I got wrong that I'd love for you to skip learning the hard way.

Hindsight is twenty-twenty. Looking back on my first two weeks of knee replacement recovery, there are three things I would do differently. Not because I made mistakes exactly, but because I know better now, and I want to hand that knowledge to you before you need it.Knee Replacement Pain Management: Stay Ahead of It, Not Behind ItI cannot stress this one enough: stay on top of your pain management. I did not, and I paid for it. The key is talking to your doctor ahead of time so you know!

Nobody told me that the most important part of knee replacement recovery happens before you ever walk into the operating room. That surprised me too — because it wasn't about what surgeon I chose or which hospital I'd be at. The three decisions that changed everything for me had nothing to do with the surgery itself.Let me take you to Cabo.Decision One: The Moment I Couldn't Ignore AnymoreBefore that trip, I'd been living around my pain for so long it had become my normal. Every plan we made had a quiet asterisk attached to it — can Suzie walk that far, will Suzie's knees hold up, should we park closer for Suzie. I was 43 years old and I was editing my life down to what my knees would allow.

If you take one thing from me and hang your hat on it through this entire recovery, let it be this: healing is not linear.I'm going to say it again, because I have said it to so many women and I will say it a thousand more times. Healing. Is not. Linear.It's like Old Faithful. The second you forget about it, something reminds you. A bad moment seemingly out of nowhere. A number that seems cemented in place. A friend who's "further along." So write this one down and keep it close.There is no single normal knee replacement recovery timelineThe biggest myth in knee replacement recovery is that there's one version of normal you're supposed to be measuring yourself against. There isn't. There is a whole bell curve of people, and every single one of them is somewhere different.

Nothing is wrong. Your knee is just loud.Last week I wrote about the question that keeps you spinning — is this normal? — and the better one to ask instead: where, exactly, is my pain? That question turns worry into work. (In case you missed it.) But there is something that has to come first, and I skipped past it.Before you can stop asking whether something is normal, you have to know what normal actually looks like.So here it is. Six things that feel like a problem and are not.The Six Things Nobody Warns You About