New Exercises...and Weight Loss

It looks like I'm ready for new exercises and they were quite the challenge today.

Reach for the cone
A small cone is placed in front of you. Balancing on the surgical leg, with a bend in the knee, you bend down to reach the top of the cone, and slowly straighten back up. 3 sets of 10.

There's a lot of pressure on the leg with this one, but it looks like this one will build back general strength with balance and stability.

Band Stretch 1 - Hip
Using a rubber stretch band clipped to the wall, one leg is hooked to the band, and while facing towards the wall, away from the wall, and the two remaining 90 degree angles, pull your leg away from the wall in each position. This exercise is performed with both your strong leg, and the repaired leg.

There's also a lot of balancing involved here, and trying to make sure that you're balanced and upright while performing this exercise. Very tiring the first time.

Band Stretch 2
Using the same rubber stretch band, face the wall, with the band hooked behind your knee. Roll your foot towards your heel to raise your toes. This action should force your knee to stretch the band.

I don't really experience that much pain during or after physical therapy. (Unless we are talking about the straight knee hang stretch...which is still quite a challenge to make it through the 10 minutes with weight. They put 7.5 lbs today, which was not fun.) I do get extremely tired though, and my ankle has been acting up a little bit more than usual. It may be the fact that I've been walking a lot more.

One situation that I'm starting to monitor is the fact that I've lost more than 15 pounds since the injury. At one point, I think I was somewhere between 185 - 190. The first time I weighed myself after the surgery I weighed in at 172. These last couple of days, despite feeling like I've been eating more, I've been weighing in at 170. I know a lot of my weight loss is losing a lot of my muscle mass from my quad muscle area. I'll need to continue to keep an eye on my weight. Even though having a variable weight between 165 - 170 would probably be okay, I think a healthier weight during this period would be between 170 - 172.

p.s. I don't endorse/recommend soft tissue injuries as a way to lose weight. Haha!