Recovered from the initial surgery. The MCL and LCL sprains seem to have healed. Had another consult with the orthopaedic surgeon to talk about some recent studies on conservative treatment with physiotherapy so we’re going to go that route for now. Delay surgery for a year to let me rehab and strengthen the muscles around the knee joint, see if I can get back to full function with climbing, surfing, hiking, etc. If I’m still feeling any instability in the knee joint, we’ll reevaluate things and likely do ACL reconstruction then. It seems like from recent studies, anywhere from 25-50% of people can return to pre-injury level without ACL reconstruction (“copers”). The only issue is they have no idea yet how to identify who will be able to function without an ACL vs who cannot. So hopefully I can be one of them, and if not, no harm.
One of the latest studies (KANON) even shows that delayed ACL reconstruction actually leads to better long term outcomes, which apparently has something to do with not putting your knee joint through the trauma of surgery so quickly after the initial injury. Obviously not possible with professional athletes who need to get back to their sport as soon as possible, but for everyone else it seems like a good way to do it.
I’ve got my rehab to the point of somewhat heavy deadlifts for the hammys, light front squats for the quads, hopping drills, and running stairs (only up) already. Going to continue with this until I can start doing full depth heavy squats without any discomfort before I start getting back into outdoor activities and sports.