A year of limping around because of my arthritic knees has left me feeling chunky and not as fit as I want to be. Since at least one of my knees is working beautifully now I am back to serious walking and exercise. The fact that I get tired after a mile is evidence that I have a long way to go to get back into the shape that I once took for granted. I know that I can do it if I put my mind to it. I mostly want to regain my energy and I am encouraged by how quickly I have recovered since my total knee replacement. While the numbers on my scale are absurd and my clothes are dangerously close to not fitting anymore I am once again able to do the work that I need to do. 

I love walking around the neighborhood. I come back home all hot and sweaty but that is to be expected at this time of year. I will no doubt either walk early each morning or late in the evening once the temperatures begin to really rise. I like seeing how people have landscaped their yards and nodding as I pass other folks who are also out for a stroll. I’d join my neighbors across the street if I were fast enough to keep up with them but for now my pace is sure and slow. 

I do lots of stretching and strengthening exercises that I learned in physical therapy. I know that they are really helpful so I don’t want to start slacking with them. I’m not nearly as dedicated to being fit as once was and still should be. I admire my grandchildren for making exercise and physical activities part of their daily routines. I’m ready to return to the days when I was like they are.

For most of my life I have been thin and energetic. My mother used to wonder why I never sat still. I was not even able to study without moving around. When I was on the stationary phones I required an extra long cord so that I was able to pace back and forth as I chatted with friends. I was one of those kids who got into trouble for tapping my feet and moving my legs around under my desk. It was an automatic habit that I was never able to quell. I suppose that was the secret to my ability to keep my weight in tow. Eventually a bout with back spasms and two arthritic knees changed me into a sedentary chunk. I watched the numbers climbed whenever I weighed myself and kept making excuses for my increasing girth. It wasn’t because I was eating too much. It was because I was just sitting around in pain. 

Now I have no excuses. I have all the tools that I need to get a move on and I have to admit to being excited over the prospect of regaining the boundless energy that once came so naturally to me that my mother suspect that I had some kind of hyperactive disorder. Like the Energizer bunny, on any given day I kept going and going and going. 

It pained me that I had to stop so much to rest when we visited London last fall so I knew that the time had come to submit to the knee surgery. Now I wish I had done it sooner. I literally waited until both of my knees were rubbing bone on bone because I feared the process of getting a new joint made out of nickel. Now I know that the first weeks are not so fun but the progress becomes more and more exponential as the weeks go by. The best part is that one of my legs is now so straight that I no longer look bow-legged, a by product of my aching knees that was so embarrassing to me. With another surgery I will be standing straight once again and with the disappearance of pain I can exercise myself into the kind of person I used to be. 

I marvel at the things that doctors are capable of doing. In just the last few years I have watched my husband’s heart be cleared of all the blockages that once threatened his life. I have witnessed his cancer going away with forty treatments that were not exactly comfortable but definitely good for him. My back no longer spasms like it once did and now one of my knees is just like new. I have to admit that such things were not even possible in times of old. No wonder older people were often portrayed hunched over and limping. 

I know people who struggled for decades with weight gains that seemed to come even when they starved themselves. Now with either operations on injections and sometimes a pill they are transformed. They get full faster and as the pounds melt away their energy returns. It is yet another medical miracle that reduces heart disease and even seems to reduce addictions. 

I often wonder where medicine will go next. I hope to see a day when scientists and doctors understand the brain so well that they are able to eradicate mental illnesses and cure people with neurological disorders such as Multiple Sclerosis, Parkinson’s disease, and ALS. I suspect that humans are closer to unlocking so many medical mysteries than we may think. Our funding for such research should be given gladly and the treatments should made  available to anyone who needs them. 

I once thought I wanted to be a doctor or nurse. I decided that I wasn’t really destined for such a vocation but I greatly admire those who dedicate their lives to helping others overcome illnesses and injuries. We should never allow our government to neglect the studies and research that is needed to advance our medical knowledge and we should all hold our medical community in the high esteem that they deserve. Every single day someone is getting a new knee, or a better functioning heart, or a treatment to eradicate a disease. I know that I cannot even measure the benefits of good medicine that have made my life so much better. It still seems miraculous to me.