not sure if you ended up getting surgery - I didn’t - but in either case I think the rehab is largely the same
Discussion
I ended up getting surgery. From everything I read I got to avoid any kind of dorsiflexion action for the first 8-10 weeks. I am on week 5. If you stretch the Achilles early in recovery from surgery it heals in an elongated state and you'll never get full strength back. I got my boot yesterday with heel lifts inside. I can finally try to stand and put weight on it while in the boot. I can barely walk but should get easier.
I am itching to start rehab. In a couple weeks I can finally start doing some things when I get out of the boot into a shoe with heel lift.
Was yours partially torn or completely torn? What made you decide against surgery?
Complete tear, but I knew right away what I had to do re not going into dorsiflexion. Just needed to get the cast ASAP and I did. Surgery outcomes are about the same as conservative so long as you’re in the cast inside of a day or two.
The heel lifts are funny eh, you get wheeled into the fracture clinic (here in Canada anyway) for the cast removal and then they tell you that you have to walk out lol, real baptism by fire moment.
Sounds like you’re going to do this without me telling you but walk on that thing with as much load as possible in the boot ASAP and often. I was pacing my hallways basically all day every day for the duration of the boot phase.
How did you find the surgery? I assume it’s still two weeks in a cast after right? And do you have that rehab sheet everyone gets? I wonder if ours are the same.