Two weeks after keyhole removal: when can I actually lift my toddler again, and when is it safe to go back to the gym?

Follow up question from me, different problem this time. The gas pain is long gone and the cuts look fine, so thank you all for that. What is doing my head in now is lifting.

I have a two year old. She does not understand waiting lists or keyhole surgery, she understands arms up. My discharge letter says avoid heavy lifting and gives no number, no timescale, nothing, and when I rang the ward the person who answered said listen to your body, which is a lovely sentence that means absolutely nothing when a toddler is climbing your leg at 7am.

So two questions. Is a small child heavy lifting? And separately, I did classes twice a week before all this and I want to know when I can go back without wrecking anything. Not chasing personal bests, just want my life back. Two weeks tomorrow since the op.

A two year old is absolutely heavy lifting. Worse than a gym weight in some ways because they wriggle and you brace without meaning to.

What I did was sit down first and let mine climb on rather than picking up from the floor. Takes the whole strain out of it.

The sitting down trick is the answer, mine was grandchildren rather than my own but same problem. Also worth telling nursery or whoever if you can, so it is not you doing the lift at the door every morning.

I was slower back to normal than the two week thing suggests, took me nearer three before I stopped noticing it.

Gym side. I went back too early to something involving planks and my lower cut let me know about it for two days afterwards. Nothing dramatic, no damage, just sore and it taught me the lesson.

What worked was walking straight away, more walking, then a very boring gradual build. Easy running by around six weeks. Anything where you brace your middle hard was the last thing to come back for me.

The vagueness in your discharge letter is frustrating but it is honest, because the guidance genuinely is functional rather than a fixed date. Still, some real anchors.

After keyhole surgery most people are back to normal day to day activities and to work in roughly 1 to 2 weeks, and light activity, walking in particular, is encouraged from the first day or two because it helps the trapped gas disperse and lowers the risk of clots. Straining and heavy lifting are the exception to that early return, and they are held back longer, commonly for several weeks, because the small cuts pass through the abdominal wall and that wall takes longer to regain its strength than the skin takes to look healed. After open surgery the whole timetable is longer, with full recovery usually around 4 to 6 weeks. The week by week recovery guide lays out the stages.

On the toddler specifically, the practical advice already given here is sound: sitting first and letting the child come to you removes most of the load, because it is the lift from floor level with a braced abdomen that generates the strain, not the cuddle itself. For returning to training, the sequence that works is walking, then unloaded movement, then gradually reloading, with anything that makes you brace hard or bear down left until last. The useful test is not a date on a calendar but whether the movement can be done without discomfort at the wound sites and without holding your breath through it.

Where I would stop guessing is your own case. How the cuts are healing, whether your operation was straightforward, and what your surgeon found are things only your team knows, so ask them for a specific limit and a specific timescale at your follow up. And anything that is going backwards rather than forwards, a wound turning red or weeping, a fever, or a swelling appearing at a cut site, is a same day call rather than a forum question.

Update because this thread deserves one. The sitting down thing works and I feel daft for not thinking of it. Nursery have been fine about the morning lift.

Three and a half weeks now, back at work properly, been for two long walks and one very cautious class where I skipped anything on the floor. Not quite myself but close enough that I have stopped counting the days.