Several years back my adult son shattered the talar bone in his ankle into six pieces. From the very beginning the doctors told him the odds were not in his favor and there was very little chance healing. Because of the extent of the injury they could not get adequate blood supply to the bone so, basically, it died and when it died so did the associated cartilage. What he ended up with was a bone on bone contact between both the six pieces and the other intact bones that adjoined it (tibia, fibula, calcaneus & navicular) which caused a tremendous amount of pain whenever he moved.
He would not let them amputate and fought the pain for about a year before he decided that it was too much for him to bear and had his leg amputated several inches below the knee. They said this was the optimum location for a prosthetic.
He said pretty much immediately afterward that it was the best decision he had made in a long time and wished he had done it when they initially suggested it instead of suffering all those months. His quality of life took a tremendous boost for the better and although he still had phantom pains in the now non-existent ankle for a few months but they were not as bad as the real thing and they too disappeared eventually..
Does he enjoy having an artificial limb? Not really. Does he enjoy being pain free? Absolutely. Can he still get around like he used too? For the most part; there are some limitations and it took some experimentation to find the prosthetic style best suited to his wants and needs but the set up he now uses has been the same for the past three years And, as I said earlier, his only regret is not having it done earlier. Well, not his only regret. He also regrets shattering the bone in the first place.