I looked up that address, but there wasn't a catalogue, so I will have to phone them. I thought I was just about done, but now I have another 4 weeks on crutches, but I am going to figure out a way to drive.  Enough is enough!  My husband can't keep taking holidays to drive me to the doctor.  Lots of people have told me to drive with my left foot, which apparently is legal, but my insurance company might not cover it if something happened, unless I tell them, and pay an extra premium.  Not worth it.  Besides, I am past the actual 6 weeks, so I think it would be okay.  I find crutches to be horrible. Besides the fact that I can't balance on my left foot, because it is so damaged, my wrists and shoulders can't take the pain either. It really aggravates them. I also think my left foot has become more damaged from hopping about on it.  I wish I had known about this before I started this journey.  Thanks.

Angie

Hi again Angie,

Glad you found the reply to the cricoarytenoid stuff ... every once in a while this site does get goofy, it blipped out on me, or maybe I hit a weird key... (clutsy RA fingers...). 

    My ankle surgery was on my right foot ...  I did eventually do both driving with my left foot (even before surgery, when my ankle/foot would just be too painful or tired/weak), and also even with a cam-walker ("camboot" to some).  It's tricky and depends on how you & it fit into your car.  I could drive OK with our Toyota Corolla, but not so well with the Sienna mini-van. 

    To slow down: when I first had problems (forever, it seems now) with my ankle, I was recommended to cast it for a month to give the tendon a rest (this was after trying orthotics, having PT with cortisone iontophoresis, which actually weakened it more I think even though it made it temporarily feel better).  I was going to get the cast, then I realized I wouldn't be able to drive, so I refused it.  (That's when my sister told me she had a friend who drove with her left foot.  I filed that for the moment!)   Instead I used a camboot/camwalker for a month.  You have to be careful driving with it because you can't "feel" the pedal, or the road, you have to react according to what you see and what the car does, not by feel.  and you have to lift your whole leg to shift your foot on the pedal.  But it can be done.  Since I'm not that tall, I also had to fold down a little, the top of the camboot so I could bend my leg a little more (I sewed it down).

    When the month was over, and my foot not really better, I 'graduated' to an AFO (idea from talking with someone else who'd just had a total reconstruction of her foot but used an AFO for 2 years).  Doc agreed to try it, and that worked for about 2 1/2 years for me.  I still had to lift my whole leg to drive, but the AFO was an answer to prayer, though the muscles in my leg somewhat atrophied from lack of use (it was a rigid one, no ankle movement).  I could walk a couple of miles in it!  What I wouldn't give to go back to that ... but it eventually began to hurt more than it helped.  So ...

    I started the route to surgery: tendon transfer & calcaneal osteotomy (they actually cut part of your heel bone and move it over.  Surprisingly not as bad as it sounds, but it was scary anyway.)  I was then in a splint for 2 weeks, in a non-walking cast for about 6, and then in a walking cast for another 3 weeks, I think.  I bought the rollabout before all this started (at the end of the year in December - had already used up all my "flex" plan medical reimbursement, but it was still worth it at $200. They also can be rented for about $35/week, but I'd end up paying the same to buy it, and then I could keep it in place of further surgery.  (BY the way, where are you located?  If I could ship it to you, I would...)  It has to be adjusted to right or left, and height.  Definitely call the company and see if you can get one!

    I'm not sure I remembered what I was going to say in this post, but ... maybe it will come back to me :-)  !

    Oh yeah - I have driven quite a bit with my left foot, and as long as a cast or boot is not too much in the way, it works quite well once you get used to it.  I've even driven 5 hours on the interstate to get to my uncle's funeral...I still do it occasionally if my right foot is tired .... I did call the State Police here in NYS just to check, and they said, as long as it wasn't a manual shift car where I would need to have both feet working, they had no problem with it.  (I didn't tell them my name just in case they said no, and I had to do it anyway.  But they really seemed very unflappable about it!

Ellen

I am north of Edmonton, Alberta. So quite far from you.  Shipping cross border can be a pain, but in the fall, my son will be back in the US playing hockey, and you could ship it to him, and I could pick it up, if I am going to get the other foot done.  I appreciate the offer. 

I have decided I am going to drive. I having been walking about on my heel since yesterday, and I got permission. What a difference it makes!  It is funny - I have had to "unlearn" the concept of never putting down my foot. My first impulse is always to keep it up, fall, hit a wall, but protect the foot. I managed to clean up the kitchen today for the first time, which was a challenge, but so much easier with a solid foot. I tried putting my forefoot down yesterday, and was rewarded with excruicating stabs of pain all night.  The surgeon said it has not healed yet, so I am going to take that as a warning, and not put much weight on it, until the foot tells me to! LOL.  I really want to start using the forefoot, though, because the ortho told me I have lost a lot of bone mass in the foot, and I don't want to end up breaking a bone, because I have lost so much density.  I doubled my calcium today, and went off the Omega Oils totally, until it is better.  I know you need to pound calcium into the bone, as I had osteopenia a few years back, and took up weights and cycling to bring it back to normal. I guess having no estrogen doesn't help the bone issue.  Today, I am going to drive the truck around the block, and see what happens.  I need the long seat to put up my foot, although I am going to play with using the cast for the gas, and the left foot for the break, which was a little trick I learned a while back.  Hopefully, my husband will pump up the flat tire on my bike, and I will get a little spinning in today, too!  Now if it would just rain, life would be very good!

Angie

I've got that too - did weights help?  I don't think I can do them due to my wrist, however.  I do have a recumbent bike but That's to keep the weight off my ankle.  Even a regular stationary bike can hurt me.

So - I guess I'm stuck!

E

Weights, cycling and lots of calcium and vitamin D.  I take 1500mg a day liquid calcium, under doctor's orders, and 2000mg Vitamin D.  I have a universal and free weights, and I did the free weights in my bed while I was recovering.  I usually ride outdoors in the summer, and I put my bike on a trainer in the winter.  It may be a while before I ride outdoors again.  It's not the riding I worry about, it is the falling. I had a bad fall two years ago, because some idiot was cleaning out his cement truck, on top of a layer of clay, and the water turned the mess into greased oil. My bike just flipped, and I landed on my right foot, and also damaged my knee.  I was most worried about the knee at the time, but other than a torn miniscous and some oestodamage, it is in good shape. But it was the final straw for my poor foot.  It separated the 2nd and third toes, and did even more damage. I could never walk without pain after that. 

My wrists can be bad, but I persist. I guess it depends on how much joint damage you actually have and how much is just flares.  Like with my feet, walking a few feet and I was done. No amount of motivation could overcome the pain.  We were in New Orleans in Jan., and I went there specifically to see the jazz on Bourbon Street.  After we had done a little walking, my hubby wanted to go see some of the clubs (You have to understand, he is a country music fan, and hates crowds, so this was a real concession for me.)  So there I was 3 blocks from some of the best jazz music in the world, and I just could not do it.  Someone said we should have taken a cab, but we are so "drive our own car" driven, we never thought of it.  Oh well, somewhere else, I guess.

So get on the extra calcium, and definitely work out.  I am sure even a recumbent would help.  I rode one in a hotel in Corpus Christi this winter, and I loved it.  I got a good work out too - although how much pressure you put on the bones isn't something I know.

Angie