Bob's bum knees

Back in 1996 I had a skiing accident and ruptured both ACLs (anterior cruciate ligaments)

I had decided to chronicle the injury, my reconstructive surgery and recovery via my webpage. In hindsight I now see that I had created a Blog -- years before the phrase was coined.

In addition to the blog I also created a message board where people who had suffered from knee injuries could discuss their injuries and recovery with others. This message board and my early blog had created an "online community" which was written about in this book:

"Online Communities: Designing Usability and Supporting Sociability"

Author, Jenny Preece (2000)

ISBN-13: 978-0471805991

The message board is no longer around, but I have preserved my original knee "blog" below:

January 10, 1996

Although I've been skiing for 10+ years, I had an unfortunate skiing accident at Killington, January 10, 1996. This one was was due to fatigue more than anything else. (we decided to take just one more run). The last mogul of the field seemed a natural place to launch into the air for one last impressive jump, but when I landed (skis straight ahead) my quadriceps decided that they didn't want to absorb the shock of the landing. My knees went to full flexion and my head went down between my knees and my knees rotated out past my shoulders. As my body's momentum further compressed me into a ball I heard a loud pop (and some noticeable pain) from both knees. I found out later that these pops where complete ruptures of the Anterior Cruciate Ligament (ACL) in both knees.

January 14, 1996

This shot was taken in my folks living room (Since I couldn't get up stairs... I wasn't back to my apartment in Hoboken until a few weeks after surgery). We had to move some of the furniture over to make room from the computer and bed (Mom loved that). Although I do miss going into the office this commute is much shorter (about 10 feet).

January 23, 1996

I got some bionic knees. At this point I'd been through a week of pre-op physical therapy and am able to walk (well sort of). The braces stabilize the knee due to my lack of an ACL and allow me to use the knee without further damaging the meniscus cartilidge.

Click here for more info about the DonJoy Legend ACL braces.

February 1, 1996

Although both ACL's have been completely torn, the surgeries will be staggered by two months (to aid in rehabilitation). Here are before and after (left ACL) surgery shots.

February 1, 1996

postop shot including the Polar Care cooling unit that circulated ice water around my knee for the first week to keep the swelling (and subsequent pain) under control.
Click here for more info about the DonJoy Cool IROM brace.

February 5, 1996

Having fun in the Continuous Passive Motion CPM machine.