Time for recovery of ACL?

K

KJ2P

Member
Just wondering how long you had or have to wait till u can ski again? My doctor says i will be good to go 6 months after surgery but my mom thinks i wont be able to go back right into skiing.
 
i had surgery april 30th of this year on my acl with no meniscus damage and i get cleared to ski on November 11th which is just over 6 months. Basically just waiting for mountains to open out here in Utah before I shred. It really just depends on how much you are working out and strenthening the muscles around your knee. Your acl is stronger now than it probabaly was before, but muscles around it are weaker. You just have to be patient and diligent during recovery.
 
i had a total reconstructive surgery and i was in jeopardy of missing my senior year of soccer. So I worked really hard in PT, and my pre surgery time to strengthen all my muscles around my knee. Because the stronger you go in, the fast you come out. anyway I was out for 4.5 months, then cleared to play soccer, ski, run, anything I wanted.

Your recovery time is really honestly up to you. The harder you work at it, the faster you will be up and at it. Or you could just sit and halfass it, and think that by doing the bare minimum it will come with time. Not the case. If you really want to ski, and you're serious about it get biking, and strengthen that knee.

there's my $0.02
 
I had mine done May 5 (fully torn acl and slight damage to meniscus, autograft from hamstrings), I won't be skiing for a while since I'm on the east coast... But since I'm at college now and the gym is a 10 min or less skate from my dorm I've been going every other day. I do the bike and the thing where you sit and put the bar on the top of your foot, straighten your leg and lift. I gotta find some other stuff to do. Any other good machines?

Possible thread jack, but you know the stretch where you bring your ankle up to your ass while standing on one foot? Same as kneeling and leaning all the way back so your back or head hits the floor. I used to be able to do that but now it's extremely painful, will stretching restore the range of motion? Or in other words, did you guys who had this restore full range of motion without any pain?

My doctor said around 6 months. I'm sure there is quite a few people who messed up their knees and wanna know stuff. This should turn into the official acl thread.

 
The location the graft is taken from makes a difference. Patellar vs Hamstring on same or opposite leg. I've heard of very fast turnarounds for NFL athletes and such using the patellar grafts from the opposite leg (I think).
But in general for a standard patellar or hamstring graft it takes about 6 months for the graft to solidify in the bone. So you're at a pretty big risk of re-injuring it if you do anything strenuous before then.
However, you have to be really diligent with your rehab to get your muscles back up to par in 6 months. There are a lot of supporting stabilizing muscles that take a while to get firing 100% again. A lot of people get almost fully recovered and then have a lot of trouble getting the last 5 or 10% back.
So, it's 6 months to be back to 100% if you rehab like a trooper. Longer if you don't.
 
Listen to that. Where most people blow it is between 3-4 months, when you're starting to feel good but the new graft is actually at its weakest stage. Hammer in PT but chill elsewhere and you should be good to go at 6 months.
 
other good stuff exercises:-tie your ankles together with yoga bands and sidestep slowly. gets your hips stronger-squats, pretty self explanatory-hamstring machine, basically the opposite of the one you mentioned above-stand on your bad leg with your eyes closed for as long as possible, helps bring your balance back- the quad stretch you mentioned did help with my range of motion but dont push it too much, little bit further everyday
good luck bro
 
i am so confused by the whole recovery time thing. doesn't it differ from person to person? and is hard to tell without many check ups before you're good to go?i wish it was 6 months for a friend of mine but ive been told he's out for the next year..
 
Thanks for ur input. i already have had surgery which was june 4th this year so im coming up to the 5 month mark and most of my muscles in my reconstructed knee are way bigger then my other but still working out lots! i can run and all that fun foot work stuff. I was really just wondering if i will be able to go back to skiing after the doctor says im good the way i was before?
 
I had my ACL replaced and medial meniscus removed last February 9th, and I was skiing (cautiously) at Mt. Hood early part of July...so only 5 months. My surgeon "advised" me to wait 6-8 months, but I felt strong and just couldn't pass the opportunity to ski hood up. I did have a custom Donjoy knee brace made which was strongly encouraged by my doc. BTW, I'm in my late 40's, so even being more "mature" ha, my knee healed up quickly and good as new. Good luck to you :)
 
if you get a patellar graft, make sure to really really really move your kneecap around. like constantly. i slacked off on that and now i have horrible tendonitis in my patellar tendon. because of that, i'm 2.5 years out, and my knee is still super sore after any activity.
 
it also depends on what graft you used. i have a pattela graft and my doctor cleared me to ski in a little under 5 1\2 months, but i also biked 15 miles everyday for the last three months, so its all up to how hard you work. but i still would`t ski hard until 7 or so months. most professional teams say thier atheletes dont come back to 100 until a year or more after. dont rush it. dont go right back to hitting jumps. get used to riding again, the knee becomes bad at small muscle alignments needed for skiing after 6 months of lower level movement. the the good snow dosen`t come until after december anyway.
 
i've had reconstructive surgery for a fully torn acl and was unlucky enough to encounter complications, a year and a half later and 3 times surgery i can finally start skiing

but i'm nowhere near freestyle again
 
Exactly correct it is literally all up to yourself. I half assed my PT and I'm sitting at 7 months right now and still not feeling 100%. I should be good to go soon, but it is literally all up to how hard you work yourself. I went in with the mindset of "oh I'll be good sooner or later" and blew off PT and working out for about a month. Dumbest decision I ever made. Sure my ACL is completely perfect, but now I have to invest that much more time into getting better before I ski again.
 
Ive never hurt it myself, but like I think it would atleast 5 months until your skiing at 100%.

Again take this as a grain of salt since I haven't had that specific injury but don't rush it and do it right :)
 
Thanks again guys! and thanks for that site^^^ lots of good stuff. I had the hamstring make up the ACL btw.
 
Got surgery March 4th, I was good to go Sept 1. I went on my trampoline the first day I could and was throwing a few doubles. You still have to take it easy a bit, but you should have no issues.
 
Tore mine Jan 2nd (stopping while skiing), surgery Sept 8, and now I'm hoping for a late march (6 month) clearance. It just really sucks to think that I may miss out on 2 seasons in a row. I'm still fresh, can't fully extend, flex and twisting is not fun, not to mention the tenderness and oh yeah the swolleness/fuild still in my knee. But, like everyone else says, it's all about consistency and sticking with your program. Lucky for me, I have a gym at work so that's where I'm spending my lunches but remember that the whole reason for the surgery is so that you can ski and do other sports and if you don't rehab properly it will put those in jeopardy.
 
yeah, i thought with mine it would be 6 months cause everyone throws that number around, but really thats just the time the graft takes to become solid enough to put some stress on it. Supposedly the graft doesnt reach full strength until a year or so after surgery(hamstring that is, patella is quicker).

Whats really important is that your muscles make a full recovery and can fire properly and are back up to strength(1 of 3 attachments for your hamstring gets chopped off the inside of your leg to make your new acl, you feel this after).
 
I was told your friend would heal faster if you brought him a cold Slurpee every tuesday and hung out and played Gnarshmellow with him. Thanks Potatoes.
 
It sounds really cliche and annoying, but do everthing the doctor tells you! I had a complete ACL tear and meniscus tear. Had two surgeries on my knee, one to fix my meniscus the other to graph a piece of my hamstring on to my ACL to make me a new one. I jumped back into sports to soon cause I "couldn't wait", now I could have fucked up this season for skiing. Since I live in Ontario, wait lines for surgery is forver, so I'm on the waiting list to get my meniscus fixed/removed asap. What I'm trying to say is your doctor knows what he's talking about. He's gone to 8+ years of university, and probably has a better idea of what's good for you knee and what's not. So wait your 6 months and don't fuck up your knee for next season as well. Ohh, and do your physio! Getting your muscle back is a huge one to! Best of luck with your recovery.
 
going right back into it probably isn't that likely. you'll need to build up the strength in your knee again but you'll easily do the work if you want to hit the slopes.

I was out for 4 months with ankle ligament damage and that was bad enough. i can imagine the ACL is a lot worse
 
yeahh my friend tore his ACL and MCL which suck cause he had to wait like 6 months for the mcl to heal and then get surgery after that for the acl and that took another 6. he also wait anoth month befor going back just to make sure cause he didnt wanna risk that again.
 
For me it's 10 months I've gotten my surgery and i'm currently in rehab, make sure you rehab you're knee any chance you can get it's the key to being able to ski a knee brace is another good idea. I have a history of knee injuries and all I can say is rehab.
 
Everyone is different. I'm pretty sure your mom is not a doctor and the doctor is, well, a doctor, so I would listen to him.

My cousin tore his in June and is pretty much out for the season I think. It's all up in the air though because everyone recovers differently. Just work hard in rehab and make it happen.
 
Lucky! I got my meniscus quickly, and that was because they didn't want it to heal improperly, but the rest has and is taking forever. These are the days that I wish I were American and I would already be in recovery. Canadian Healthcare sucks!
 
i had surgery last feb 12, was cleared in mid august, and since i wasnt playing any sports yet i took it somewhat easy (i was still lifting and running and sprinting a ton but took it easy on sharp cuts and such) and i was playing football by september and it feels fine. I got hamstring graft and honestly my reconstructed knee with a brace on feels better than my "good" knee. Its all about how much u put into the recovery and just ur natural process.
 
All depends on how bad it it. An average recovery time (depending on effort put in to P.T. and what not) can be anywhere from 5-9 months, obviously more if when recovering you don't work as much to get it better. Hope you recover fast man!
 
just rehab like crazy. Take breaks when you are sore and be cautious. I skied all of last season(starting exactly 6 months out of surgery in december) and had no real issues. I took it pretty easy and just slowly progressed back to the level I was at before the injury. Everyone is different, but one thing is for sure. You wont be able to do anything without getting all your muscle back.
 
just got my acl fiksed 2 weeks ago, hamstring. fuckin sucks to lose a season before it started. lookin to get back at it early April reahabing like a motherf..... ! got a prescription on a Custom CTI knee brace too! stoked on that
 
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