I broke my patella in half in 1996-97. Horizontal in one clean break, I hit a tree in my truck and the speaker box drove me into the dash breaking my knee. I spent two days in the hospital and 6 hours in surgery. They had to wire my knee and place two pins in to hold it all together. I had a strait leg cast for almost 12 months and by time I started physical therapy my leg was about the same circumfluence as my arm and I could only bend it 10-15 degrees due to all the scar tissue. I worked on it for quite awhile and got most of the muscle back but have had to endure six more surgeries.
One time one of the pins was working its way out of the top of my knee so I went in and they pulled one of the pins. Now the dumb ass Dr. should have just removed all the hardware since the pins where holding the wire together. A month later the wire started to tangle and one of the sharp ends was starting to poke through my skin and it hurt like a mofo. So I had to go in for another visit this time they put me out and removed all the hardware THANK GOD. I have been back three more times to have them go behind my knee cap and remove scar tissue so I could get my full range of motion back.
Ten years later and it’s almost as good as new, minus the really, really cold days. Squats are not fun either, but I’m happy to have a fully semi functional knee. I do triathlons now and it really never bugs me and I have a kick ass 12” scar all the way down my knee.