The last ten days were tough. Last week’s physio (which I complained about in my last post), took 6 full days to recover. Discussing it with my physiotherapist this week (an appointment I almost canceled numerous times), he agreed we were probably pushing too hard.

He surmised that my kneecap isn’t gliding properly yet, and when I bend my knee, it doesn’t track along its groove well, which causes irritation in the cartilage underneath. Sounds plausible.

More reps on the bike needed, and less loading, pressure and intensity generally. Double-up on ice.

I walked into my surgical follow-up this morning with all this in mind, looking forward to getting some feedback. My 2-hour visit to VGH (for what amounted to five minutes with the doctor) included getting x-rays and lots of waiting.

When he finally came to see me, he led with “so everything looks good…”. Wait a minute. What about, “how are you doing?”. Turns out he doesn’t care – from what he saw on the x-ray, things are in the right place and that’s apparently the limit of what he, a surgeon, cares about.

“But… pain,” I mumbled, to which he nodded and said “yeah, yeah, normal.”

I suppose if I want attentive aftercare, I need to go to my clinic.

But I’ll be fine – everything seems to be on track, so I will dial things back a bit but keep going with the program. My next, “and final,” visit to the surgeon will be mid-October.