Back to work!

Still no speculating on the success of the operation as it is still too early to say, but I thought it would be useful to talk about my first two weeks back at work. I went back exactly 10 weeks since the operation, on a phased return. My employer has been very flexible and the idea was that I would start on just 2.5 hours a day from home and work it up as it becomes more possible. I have found that I have been able to do a little more than this without it having a detrimental effect on progress. I have done between 3 and 4.5 hours a day and hope that I can increase this a little over the coming weeks. Increasing it will be hard as I am still not sitting down for any prolonged period (just 4 or 5 mins two times a day) so all of my work is done standing up. My sense is the sitting will come in time and I should not push it too much. It certainly causes some discomfort in the pelvic floor as well as a soreness into the scar area.

It has been really good to be back doing some work and interacting with people, albeit remotely for now. Even if I cannot increase my hours over the next week or two I hope to go into the office a little more - to normalise things and increase my ability to move more etc. Key to being able to go back to work a bit ahead of schedule has been been being able to do it from home. I also think I have benefited as a result of doing a good job of resting as much as possible in the immediate weeks after the operation, before then gradually increasing the walking and mobility from about week 4 or 5. The yoga and swimming that I was doing a lot of before the op meant that my fitness, strength and flexibility were pretty good and therefore I did not lose too much in the weeks that I was bed and sofa bound. I know from other people's experiences that this can be a real vicious circle so I am grateful for the the work I put in beforehand. 

I went swimming last week! Very cautiously, just 10 slow lengths. It seemed fine and was so nice to be in the water and do something normal again. I tried not to kick my legs too much and let my arms do the work (front crawl). As my flexibility has started to return I have also been doing some very gentle stretches that I learned from yoga. A physio mate of mine impressed on me the need to very gently begin to stretch that area in order to ease out the scar tissue that will be building up. The increased body awareness gained from doing yoga means I am quite confident in knowing what I can and cannot do. It is definitely trail and error though! I have also continued with the mindfulness meditations on a daily basis, particularly since starting back at work when the need for a quiet few minutes has increased a touch!! As mentioned before I have found these very helpful - the body will do what it does and I have little control over that, but I can to an extent control how I feel about it all, and remaining positive is definitely a good thing! I will update this again in a few weeks with how things continue to progress.