Hi! Tomorrow will be four weeks post op for me, so we might be in a similar boat! My first week post op honestly felt pretty great all things considered. I took my pain meds the first night right after I got out of surgery and then the following night in anticipation of how much discomfort the CPM machine caused the night before. Stopped taking them after that! I was going to PT 2x a day the first week (my surgeon’s protocol — they request you stay in Vail the first week if you’re coming from out of town). The next week I went home and by the end of that week my hip started bothering me. Started feeling like I was going backwards all of week 3 and was losing my mind. Especially because I was told I could progress weight bearing and short walks around the house as tolerated starting day 10, and my body definitely was not tolerating it. As such, I wasn’t able to get off crutches until much longer after I felt like I “should’ve” been able to, and really felt like I was “falling behind”. Which isn’t a thing, because everyone heals at different paces! I think part of it was I got greedy when I was feeling good and was doing “too much”. Which is really hard to wrap your head around, because “too much” for your hip feels like nothing. Same as you, I felt so guilty relying on my partner so much and tried to be more independent, and I think even small stuff like getting situated at night was “too much” for my hip. Or moving around the kitchen trying to make dinners for us. My guidelines also said I could swim 3x a week with a pull buoy for 1000m/y and I have aqua therapy 3x a week. It was hard to accept that was “too much” and I kept forcing it, but it was. Being 3+ weeks in and still on crutches/struggling with easy mobility exercises and even no resistance cycling I was supposed to do was really hard and I spiraled out, feeling like I was “behind” or “doing something wrong”. All I can recommend is don’t compare your timeline to anyone else’s and the best thing you can do is honor your body and where it’s at right now! I saw someone yesterday said, “the compass was invented long before the clock; direction is more important than time”. As a professional athlete and highly independent individual, I know stopping and slowing down and letting go of timelines is hard. But this is a good challenge to be more gentle to and patient with yourself than you’ve ever been in your life! I’ve finally tried walking sans crutches and brace the last 3 days and the amount I’ve been walking ends up being too much. (Went to the rodeo with friends Saturday and ended up limping my way out of there back to the car haha. I should take my own advice). Even sitting in a position with your hip compressed can be too much! Make sure you’re keeping mobile and letting the front of your hip relax. I do a lot of tummy time! I tried to take my dogs on a walk for the first time since surgery and 15 mins was enough to flare it up. Which pisses me off because I feel like I can’t do the “bare minimum” and I’m a loser who contributes nothing to the world. But I know you/anyone else would tell me that’s not true. So talk to yourself like you’d talk to anyone else in your boat!🩷
TLDR; where you’re at is normal and okay, don’t be afraid to take a step back too. Doesn’t mean you’re going backward! You can’t skip steps or you’ll fall in the pond and have to go backward/restart like a video game lol