To all my friends on KNEEgeeks,
I am on my way to my healthy life with my new knees. Being able to walk for exercise, take up golf (we live on a golf course but haven't played one game yet  ), play with my 5 little grandboys, ride the Harley, keep up with my junior high students in my library, just basically live my life as a healthy 58-year-old woman...this was my dream when I start out on this journey.
I run into people every day who have been advised to consider knee replacement surgery, and they tell me they are scared or worried about the outcome based on horror stories they have heard. I think everyone knows of a person who had TKR or PKR, who had a bad experience with it. I feel for those folks and I am sure this can happen.
But I am here to tell you that with the right attitude, the right doctor that you can love and trust and put your life in his hands, and the right physical therapist, PKR and TKR can be the best thing you ever did for yourself. It will improve your quality of life and even extend your life.
I send blessings and prayers to my PKR friends. As each individual gradually pulls away from posting here, we all know that person is experiencing success in their recovery. Usually no news is good news on KNEEgeeks! But we all check in from time to time, just to keep up with old friends, and we are all here for each other. We celebrate our triumphs on this board, and commiserate when in the dumps.

School is starting for me soon and I am already underwater. For the first time in about 8-9 years I am looking forward to starting my school year pain free. Not TOTALLY pain free...I still have stiffness in the morning, pangs here and there when the weather changes, aches when I do too much. And I know this partial replacement will eventually wear out and I will be forced to have totals. But I know my limitations...my dream of attending spinning classes will not happen. But I can get on the bike and pedal to my heart's content at a regular pace. My dream of going back to Body Pump will not happen, but I can exercise all I want in a gentler way.
One thing I want to stress to anyone who is going through this is stretching. I feel like I can never get enough stretching in. I was never a runner, but I was a gym rat. I know now that I never stretched as I should all those years in the gym.

ANyway, everyone take care and I hope and pray for success for everyone here.
Pat

Thanks Stan,
I know I won't be able to post much now that I will be going back to work Monday. Maybe it's the teacher in me...always trying to motivate and inspire. Anyway, take care of your 'nother' knee, that pressure in the back is how both mine started, but it took years to get me to the PKR stage. Let's hope it improves as your surgery knee gets stronger. We are not that far out from surgery, after all!
Blessings and enjoy that bike!
Pat