Back to Tennis & Running on a Partial Knee Replacement

You just need to live with the pain until you can't, you're too young for a knee replacement, which seemed ridiculous to me. My thought process behind my recovery was Lindsay Davenport has broken every bone in her body and torn every ligament, and she's back on the slopes. And so why can't I? Hi, my name is Lori and I had a partial knee replacement. My injury started probably 10 years ago. I had two meniscus terrors on the inside and outside of my knee. And five years ago I had them both repaired with the promise and hope that I would be pain-free. And back to sports. I'm a tennis player and a runner, and after five years it was still, I still had a lot of pain. And so someone referred me to Dr. Stone after visiting probably three or four other orthopedic surgeons in the Southern California area.

I came here and was very impressed with everything and very happy. Well, I definitely was a tennis player and a runner. I probably ran 20, 25 miles a week and two after my meniscus surgery, my running disappeared most, almost completely. And I still played tennis. Usually it created a lot of stiffness in my knee and sore recovery pain. I wore a brace. One of the orthopedics that I visited fitted me for a brace and said I just needed brace support and strength training and I should be fine. I was too young for a knee replacement and told me I wasn't a candidate. And I went back to the orthopedic that did my meniscus repair surgery. And he also said, you just need to live with the pain until you can't. You're too young for a knee replacement, which seemed ridiculous to me.

My thought process behind my recovery was, Lindsay Davenport has broken every bone in her body and torn every ligament, and she's back on the slopes. And so why can't I? So that was really honestly my reason to keep trying to pursue somebody that would help me with my pain. So, and here I am really is, you know, being, having that kind of surgery out of reach for the average person seems unfair. So that was really frustrating to me to be told over and over. Bummer for you, it's just life. You're just getting old, but you're not old enough. You're not old enough to have surgery. And so it was really frustrating to hear that. And I actually ran into a friend whose husband had, had Dr. Stone, had done surgery for him, and he Was a tennis player. So I called that day, made a, an appointment for a consult, and here I am. I just wanted to go back to a normal active lifestyle. I also had bone on bone. My cartilage was gone from the outside of my knee. So I was bone on bone, which made my knee not straight. So I always felt a little bit self-conscious of its appearance and I just wanted to be active again with a straight leg. And when I came up here, I actually was consulting for a meniscus transplant and then talked to him about both options and then ultimately a meniscus transplant was not even possible. I was too far gone and I'm thrilled that, that we ended up with the knee replacement. It's just the best. I just had a lot of confidence in him after talking with him and doing some research on him, I just felt confident that was it.

And, you know, once I was here, I just knew that I finally found the place that was gonna work for me, never to think about my knee again. The rest of my life, that's what I want. And so far, most of my days I don't notice my knee. So I just wanna be more active and just resume my physical life as I used to behave and not have to worry about strength and weakness, you know, lack of strength and weakness in my knee, I guess. So, which I'm working towards. I definitely had a lot of pain before, sometimes I would've to sleep with my knee, hanging off the side of the bed to relieve the pressure. I literally wore a brace like almost every day just trying to support the knee. And I, but I still, I still played tennis and I couldn't run, I couldn't really do a lot of weight-bearing exercises at all.

So I noticed that my leg was atrophied and my muscles have gone on vacation. So we're trying to get them back active. So the difference is now I can play tennis, now I can run getting back into a little bit of running, working, all that. My, I have a lot, I have a ways to go, but I'm doing really good. Please, I would recommend to anybody never to wait. That would be my biggest recommendation. I waited five years and lived with pain for five years and I have already told lots of people to, to talk to him, you know, because why they shouldn't wait. And that is my biggest regret that I waited so long to do something about the pain because I feel like it has inhibited the rest of my physicality. And so I have more work to do because I waited and that's my biggest recommendation is do not wait.