DOUG PORTER: Getting back to normal

I see in the sporting news that Carolina Panthers quarterback Cam Newton and I have something in common, despite him being a wealthy, young NFL superstar and me being an old, retired zoo director.

We both had surgery to repair a torn rotator cuff at about the same time — he with his right arm on March 30 and me with my left arm one week later on April 6. Now, after 12 weeks, neither of us is 100 percent, but we are both apparently making good progress.

He is throwing the football again for the first time and I am able to reach out the car window at the fast-food drive-thru.

It is a long road back from this type of surgery. With some surgeries, the doctors want the patient up and using the affected parts in a matter of days, doing rehab and walking the halls of the hospital.

With rotator cuff, however, the arm must be immobile for weeks while the repairs to the muscles and their attachments heal. That meant my left arm remained in a sling for about five weeks.

It also meant that while I was relatively pain-free during that period, the muscles in my left arm were becoming atrophied as my left shoulder joint was stiffening.

The good news is that the pain was not as bad as I had expected. The bad news is that I am paying for it now, as we try to loosen my left shoulder joint and strengthen and stretch my muscles. I am in more pain now than I was the day after the surgery.

After my arm was out of the sling and my physical therapy began at week six, I thought I was doing well until the first time I pulled up to the drive-thru at the bank, only to realize I could not raise my left arm high enough to reach out the window of the car. I had to park and go inside to conduct my business.

After that, I did not even try to drive up to the mail box at the post office, the ATM machine at the bank, or the drive-thru at any fast-food place.

After surgery, my doctor instructed me to sleep in my recliner. This provided support to the shoulder while it healed and prevented injury while rolling around in bed as I slept. I wonder if Cam Newton has been sleeping in his living room with a sheet thrown over his recliner all this time? Probably not. His annual salary is reported to be over $20 million. That means he makes more in one day than I make all year, so he probably has special accommodations.

What I find most interesting is this. I imagine Mr. Newton had his surgery at some fancy clinic by the best doctors money can buy. I’m also sure he has a team of trainers who are with him seven days a week and who chart his every move to ensure their multi-million dollar quarterback is back on the field as soon as possible.

But he can’t be any more pleased with the results of his procedure than I am. My surgery was done right here in Albany by great medical team. I go to physical therapy twice a week and my progress is carefully monitored by my team of physical therapists — young women in pastel scrubs who chat about life as they stretch my arm in directions it clearly does not want to go.

According to the article, Cam Newton is as pleased with the results of his surgery and recovery as I am. And this fall, he will be scampering around the football field dodging 350 pound tackles while I am harnessing my mules and sitting comfortably in my wagon seat when quail hunting season begins — life back to normal, for both of us.

Doug Porter is the former executive director of Chehaw in Albany.