Weekend knee report

The sudden realisation when I got up to take my first drugs of the day was that they are running out! I only took one Tramadol this morning and there are just 5 of these left now, so if I have just one every 5 daytime hours, they will be finished by lunchtime tomorrow. It was always the plan that I come off the heavy meds this weekend, but it's only 24 hours since I was in severe pain again.

I've still got Ibuprofen and Paracetamol that I can take in the event of pain, and I still have to take the Rivaroxaban (blood thinners) for another 5 days

Today has started pretty well, however - at least I was able to talk to Kelly in our regular morning FaceTime today. I was pretty sensible yesterday and didn't try any exercises or walking, but I plan to try to walk up to the village again today.

Dan Corbett came in to see me yesterday afternoon when Jo was at her swimming, so that helped distract me and while away some more time. The golf from Turkey was also pretty good and I also watched an old movie I had never seen - The Shining. Jack Nicholson at his most scary.

I had also watched another old movie featuring Jack Nicholson the day before - Tommy. I hadn't seen this since viewing the original cinema release at the Leicester Square Odeon almost 40 years ago - with Jo and Barry. Gary had just been born and Barry drove Mum down to see us and Mum babysat, whilst the three of us drove in to Central London - open-topped. There are a lot of scenes in the movie I just didn't remember. It's a bit dated as well, but there are one or two good musical sequences.

Anyway, it looks like the swelling on my leg is definitely going down - I can feel and almost see it now. We've been keeping daily measurements on a spreadsheet and whilst it's not always easy to measure exactly the same spot every day, there's no doubt this is moving in the right direction:

The readings on the left were taken on my "normal" knee on Tuesday morning and that's effectively the target for the right knee. We started with 2" to lose off the calf and thigh and 3" to lose off the knee itself, and we're now down to just 1" to lose off the calf and thigh but still 2" to lose off the knee.

That's it for today - day 20 of my real ale fast. The heavy meds are coming to an end so I could be breaking my fast early next week - just too late for the Stonehaven Real Ale Festival, which finishes today.