My left knee had all the ligaments torn, doc said it looked like a bowl of spaghetti, and the arthritis in there looked like I had fur lining.... Needless to say, out-patient surgery(in Columbus, at a Sports-medicine office that I cannot remember the name of), they took some ligaments from off the shin(still numb there after 10+ years) and put it all back together(even scraped off the fur lining). Doc had me at physical therapy the day after surgery, off crutches within a week, and almost no pain medicine.....quite possibly the worst 3 weeks of pain I can remember. Do the Physical Therapy. Those people know their $hit, and if I hadn't done the physio, I know I would not be moving worth a damn. Stairs were my downfall, and they had more exercises than I ever dreamed of to get me back up to 80% within a month, and now I would say my left knee is in better shape than my right one. In fact, I took 4 weeks off work and built a fence as part of my physical therapy, during the hottest part of the summer. Now, it pops occasionally, arthritis isn't too bad, and if I really need to, I can run, I just prefer to walk, bike, swim, etc.
