Medically enforced sedentary for 2-4 weeks. Thoughts?

SafioraLinnea

I had some minor surgery to remove a (high risk to develop cancer) birthmark on my leg. It resulting in nearly 20 stitches, 8 on the outside, 10 or 12 internal (I can't really count those ones!) and I'm pretty much non-mobile. The doctor said for me to take it as easy as humanly possible for the next two weeks, and reassess at the checkup/stitches removal appointment.

Since starting this health journey, I've lost 25 pounds and gained a ton of muscle, which apparently means that I am *really* stable standing on the one good foot. I had no idea how strong I was! I can hop around on the good leg fairly well but it is relative -- I'm extremely tired from all the hopping at the end of the day and I only mobilize for necessities - food, water, and restroom breaks.

My concern is that I'm going to gain weight and lose muscle... Going from 300ish minutes of mostly cardio training a week to practically nil makes me nervous. I don't consider hopping on one foot from the kitchen to the couch, or couch to restroom as exercise, and that really is all my body says I can manage without feeling like I'm tearing my stitches. The location of the stitches makes the stitched area high risk to tear if I don't let myself heal and I'd rather keep my stitches intact and healthy.

I've been maintaining my diet portion of MFP as it was before I had the birthmark removed. Do I need to up my calories a bit while I heal or is that counter-productive? Information has been rather conflicting and that was the one thing I failed to talk to the surgeon about. I'll call his office tomorrow but any thoughts or been there, done that experiences?

meshashesha2012

i think when your body is healing it's nuts to even worry about losing weight :huh: i mean dont you think your body is already going through enough with surgery and healing to throw forcing it into a calorie deficit in the mix? if you eat at maintenance then you wont be gaining weight

and you wont be losing muscle in 2-4 weeks unless you're actually having muscle removed

Phaedra2014

Focus on getting well. You're body will heal and you will go back to working out like before. Right now it's probably best to rest.

Get well soon!

sharpeoplepc

I would do as the Dr. ordered and remain sedentary. Change your MFP settings to maintain your current weight and don't stress. The faster you get healed, the faster you will be back to exercising and losing weight!:flowerforyou:

BTW, I feel your pain. Being sedentary for 2 weeks would drive me crazy too!

Macrocarpa

I hear your frustration having been sidelined through injury several times. It must be worse still to be doctor-mandated sedentary.

2-3 weeks isn't going to put you too far back fitness wise, so don't stress about that.

My only advice is to heed their recommendations, but communicate with them throughout the follow-up process (when can I start doing this, when can I start doing that, etc etc). My physio was pretty stoked when I asked what I could do to speed up recovery / recuperation time, and put me onto a programme of stuff that would get me back out running as quickly as possible, which was great - anticipated 5 weeks off, ended up back on the road at 3.5

nz_deevaa

I had knee surgery in Feb. And my doctor suggested the same thing. I moved my MFP settings to Sedentary and to maintain.

In the first week I woke up starving 3 times, and each time I got up and ate.

I STILL lost weight.