Two and a half weeks later...

I had surgery on Halloween, spent two weeks recuperating in a busy house with 3 small kids, and finally was able to return to work on Tuesday.

Physically, I still can't feel the back of my left leg, my left foot has mostly stopped tingling, and I walk very slowly with a slight limp.

My incision in my back is a bit itchy, but mostly healed up. My back is still stiff but it doesn't cause the same amount of pain as before.

Mentally, I'd say that life is not getting any better. I haven't been at 100% physically since June, and the strain is starting to get to me. Both neurosurgeons I talked to said that recovery would be slow, but I always hoped that because I had it diagnosed early that recovery would be faster. The nurse seemed surprised that I was nearly off painkillers this soon. But I still can't do the things I need or want to do. Sitting down for more than 20-30 minutes makes my back really stiff. Standing makes it better, but then my feet start to hurt after awhile...

I took one last night just to wind down after a long day and to help me to ignore the residual pain that I hadn't noticed during the day. Even though I'm down from as many as as many as 6 pills a day (right after the surgery), I can't help thinking this is how addicts get started.

Hard to concentrate on work, hard to make things work, hard to just pay attention to things that I need to remember...

Surgery

this will be short. Surgery went fine. Dr said that a he was impressed by the size of the disk he had to remove, but it all went well. I am back at home and lying on my side on the c0uch. They gave me a some extra potent hydrocodone after surgery, but like all painkillers it makes me sleepy. My back is stiff as hell. There is a bit of pain if I move weird, but for the most part, if I lay still there is no pain at all.

Halloween is an unusual time to be anywhere. When I woke up. one of the nurses had brought in her two sons to show off their costumes - one was batman, the other was a cowboy. Batman had a gun. When one of the nurses asked him about it, he said it was his laser gun. Gotta love kids.

Halloween

Last weekend was nice - good weather allowed me to take the kids to the park and played quite a bit with them on Saturday.

We carved pumpkins (well, they watched for the first 5 minutes but quickly got bored). Hope the pumpkins last to Halloween. We'll see.

We tried on Halloween costumes yesterday. Danny wants to be a doctor - again, and Fiona will be whatever costume we get her (she doesn't know what she wants to be). My mom found a leftover Fairy costume of my sisters. It's a bit big for her (being an Adult small), but that means instead of being a half-length skanky costume (as it's intended), it's a full length frilly costume that barely fits her - we will be keeping several safety pin manufacturers in business this weekend.

Here's last year's costumes - Fiona was Dora, Danny was a Doctor. Aidan was a lion. Aidan didn't last very long in that costume. He went to bed early so we don't have a picture of him in his lion costume.


One word of caution. Fiona is a blonde. Dora the Explorer has black hair. So, I bought some Black spray-on hair coloring for her "Dora costume". It was water-soluble, so by the end of the night, she was no longer Dora the Explorer, but Dora the Coal-Miner... I don't know what's in her mouth. Black Licorice? I know it's something candy related, but it doesn't look normal, whatever it is

T-1 Day

Well, it's one day away from surgery. Within 24 hours, I will hopefully be recuperating from my back surgery.

I am a bit anxious, but not about the surgery - I don't want to wait any more to be able to feel my leg and walk normally.

I got a call from the Siouxland Surgery Center that asked me all the normal pre-op questions. If I'm on any medications, if I"m allergic to anything, if I have high blood pressure, any diseases, smoke, drink, etc. Then she said that she has a bed arranged for me to spend the night, and the room has a DVD player. She confirmed that I would likely be using that room overnight, unless something really weird happens.

Last night, I found that I was able to support almost all my weight on my left foot - tiptoes. I suppose I am either re-learning how to walk again after losing a nerve, or the rest of my calf muscle got stronger...

And surgery

My pain in my leg settled into a dull pressure, and although I can make my leg hurt again if I want to, it takes some effort, and normally, I don't try to do so.

I saw a new neurosurgeon closer to home, Dr. Thorir Ragnarsson. I had to drive to Yankton to see him, but even with the snow, it wasn't a big problem. He asked me what I did. He then told me that he probably wasn't going to tell me anything I didn't know already.

He poked, prodded, and looked me over, and then explained to me his conclusions. I have a textbook case of an L5-S1 ruptured disk. It's pushing on my L5 nerve pretty good, which is why my leg is numb in certain spots. So, I asked him a few questions:

1) WIll I recover? Most likely. Some people lose their sensation.
2) Why does my lower leg work at all? - The nerve is still sending out some impulses, but not all of them are getting through.
3) What about a nuclear implant? - They're available in Europe, but they're hard to come by in the USA, because they're not approved by the FDA yet. Plus, with the low incidence of recurrance, it's normally not worth the risk to inject goop near your spinal cord.

He said that surgery was my best bet, and then surprised me by saying he was available tomorrow. It wasn't an emergency, but the way my nerve was compressed, I wasn't getting any better by waiting - and any time wasted would lessen my chances of a complete recovery.

He showed me my MRI and CT scan, and showed how the disk is completely covering up the nerve, and how the CT scan looks worse than the MRI.

But I needed some time to talk it over with Rhonda, work, and figure things out. Before I left, I signed a sheet of paper saying that all possible side-effects had been discussed, including infection, spinal fluid leakage, anesthetic related problems, Deep Vein Thrombosis, and Death. I certainly don't remember the doctor telling me I could die, but I'll just assume that's likely only if I don't follow the pre-op instructions exactly.

I went back to work, and called the nurse, also named Rhonda, and scheduled surgery for Thursday, October 26th at 1:00.

After surgery, I will be out for 2 weeks. During that time, I can't sit for more than 20 minutes at a time. I can't bend, stretch, or twist. I can lay down, or I can stand up. Sounds like exciting times for me are in store.

Continued Pain

My back is still in the same shape it was last weekend, with one minor addition- I now have a tightness in my left leg that is pretty unusual. I am also having some spasming one of the muscles in my butt. It is possible that it's my Piriformis muscle, but I am not entirely sure.

In addition, it feels like the hamstring in my left leg is very tight and stretched to the cramping point continuously. It is still painful to walk, but I can walk, er, shuffle, for several blocks without having to stop. I now look like Quasimodo when I walk.

Return of the Pain

Well, I went way too long on my story, so I"ll give the abbreviated version to catch me up to present.

After the first dose of the Med pack, i had a follow up with the doctor, who asked me if I had any discomfort. I told the truth, and said that I had a mild sensation in my lower back. She said, well, that means that we need to kick it up a notch. She then decided to continue on with a ESI, or Epidural Steroid Injection, as well as a consultation with a Neurosurgeon. THe neurosurgeon would require an MRI, so we should get that done too.

So, even though my pain was pretty minor, I had the MRI, which requires you to be stuffed into a tube that you are SURE you don't fit in. I would not consider myself claustrophobic, but I really really wanted it to end about half-way through. However, things got a lot better when I opened my eyes and say that my head was out the back of the machine... I was convinced that the tube was closed in the back, and had some quiet internal panicking when I realized that I would suffocate... Needless to say, I was fine. However, the country music didn't help very much.

THe results were what they expected. A herniated L5-S1 disk pushing on my S1 nerve root. About 2 weeks later, I had my ESI, and the next day, had the consultation.

The ESI was neat, but they knocked me completely out for it. I'mnot sure if it's standard procedure, but it sure made it go quicker.

The next day, I drove to Sioux Falls to talk to Dr Mark Fox. He said that a Herniated disk is normally no big deal. 40% of all people seem to have a herniated disk, and it's only painful to a handful of them. He said that the litmus test is this: If I can not stand the pain, then I should have surgery. If I can stand the pain for the rest of my life, then don't have surgery. But make the decision soon. He said I should be able to decide within two weeks if I need surgery. However, the longer I stall, the less likely I will have a full recovery.

About 3-4 days later, the ESI corticol steroids kicked in, and I was again, feeling amazing. We were moving, so I was moving heavy items. However, last Wednesday, when I was carrying salt bags out to the car to move them to the new house, I felt a weird sensation in my back. Sorta like when you step on a loaf of bread, except that loaf of bread was in my back.

Wednesday, I felt some pain in my leg. Not bad.
Thursday, that pain felt a bit more. Not terrible, but I took an Ibuprofen to try and help.
Friday, I had super-extreme pain, 8-9 out of 10. It was awful. All through the workday it got worse. I took about 13-15 Ibuprofen, but still literally could not walk more than 30 feet without having to sit down. Sitting in the chair was even worse. I drove home after work and crawled in the front door and asked Rhonda for anything to kill the pain. She gave me my last Tramadol, an Ibuprofen 800, a Muscle relaxant (Flexor) and some Tylenol with Codeine. I passed out holding my leg in pain. I woke up again at 4:00 AM and needed some more medicine.

Saturday: About 8:00, I woke up in pain. Rhonda gave me another codeine, andI tried to get out in time for breakfast. After breakfast, I noticed that my leg pain was giving way to another sensation - numbness.

This numbness was better than the pain, but troubling nonetheless. Rhonda decided that I needed to see a doctor IMMEDIATELY, so off we went.

After some debate, I decided to go to Mercy's Emergency Room because they had the technology to fix me if I was deemed broken enough to repair. Instead, all I got was an apology (we can't get you the MRI today) some reassurance (your nerve willbe fine) and a couple prescriptions (Hydrocodone 5/500 and Med-Pack).

I will see my friendly doctor (PA-C, actually) this week, hopefully. Until then, I am completely numb from the back of my left leg halfway up my butt, down to my knee, and feel tingling on my heel all the way to my little toe.

Two good things about my doctor - PA-C means that my PA is nationally certified. She was also on the class schedule for teaching several 700 level classes in the Med School. Extra cool, and an extra boost of credibility. PLus my hydrocodone is making me feel nice and pleasant right now...