Hello everyone!

I should start off and say that my initial photo is probably the worst I’ve looked and felt in my entire life, so please bear with me, LOL.

It has been 18 days since my surgeries, and I thought it was about time I wrote up a post to share with everyone how things are going. For my readers, I am not only sharing my recovery, but I am also hoping that other people who must go through an ALIF and TLIF may learn something from my experience. There are so many conflicting stories online that I was frightened by some and reassured by others. Someone had mentioned that a lot of people go through the procedure following an accident and are most likely exaggerating for lawsuit purposes, so my story will be an honest account.

Okay so let's get to it. I checked into the hospital on September 5, 2012 at 5 am. I was nervous, but everyone was very nice. My procedure was done in a new hospital that specializes in neurosurgery and orthopedic surgery, so it was small, intimate and everyone was very friendly.  After my intake, they took me in the back room, had me change, set up my IVs, took some vitals and then knocked me out. The last thing I remember is being wheeled away and saying goodbye to my husband.

The next thing I knew, I was in a large, spacious room with a huge wall-mounted television and someone laughing at me because I kept wiggling my toes and exclaiming “I can feel my toes!”. That became a joke amongst the nurses because I guess in my medicated mind I was very affected by that. The rest of the first day was pretty much a blur, although I do remember my two children coming in to see me for a short time. The introductory photo is from their visit. You can probably tell by the lost-in-space look on my face that I have no idea what's happening, haha.

Because I was so loopy, they did not make me get out of the bed the first day. The second day was the worst. I woke up in a lot of pain, and it took them some time to realize that they were under-medicating me. I had been taking 30mg of Percocet daily, and they had been giving me 10mg. Even though I was in a lot of pain, I was a trooper because I was so eager and did get out of bed and walk a few feet. I’m not going to lie; there were tears pouring down my face the entire time. At that point, my husband told the nurse I needed the larger dose of medication. They came running in and gave me a straight shot of morphine, and I was out again for the rest of that day.

Day three was so much better. I got up and moved around a lot easier. Once my medication was regulated, I was so happy to be able to lie with my legs flat, and I wanted to start moving right away. It was great to get up and move. I was able to shower, but I still was not ready to go home.

Although my outlook was fantastic, and I was motivated enough to be a favorite patient, my surgeon was not in any rush to send me home. By day three, they began loading me up with stool softeners and laxatives. I believe I took four. Trust me - that worked! I thought I would be able to go home on Saturday, but my surgeon wanted to keep me in for that fifth day. I agreed, for it was nice to just catch up on all that missing sleep I’d had over the past year of pain.

Sunday arrived and my docs came in to tell me they would let me go home that afternoon. I had already showered with a shower chair and was walking every day, so I felt ready. It’s strange, you do feel weak, but you also feel so much better without the kind of pain you had been going through. So I went home on day five.

A side story about my incisions:  

The ALIF and TLIF surgeries require both a front and back incision. I have what appears to be a large c-section incision in my abdomen around my bikini line and then a four or so inch incision in my back. My understanding (and please don’t hold me to this) is that the approach surgeon comes in, opens my abdomen, pushes aside my intestines, clamps apart my vena cava and aorta so my surgeon could reach my back. From there, my back surgeon did the approach, removed the collapsed disc, ground down the two vertebra to insert the clamp.  Then they rolled me over, opened my back, inserted the rods and screws, ground out the extra bone that had been pinching my nerves and used that bone as my bone graft to begin the infusion. They reported that everything went so well that I was done 2 1/2 hours earlier than expected – see everyone? I’m tough! LOL. When I originally came out of surgery, my abdomen was so bloated that I appeared to be about seven months pregnant. Since then some of the air has escaped, and the discomfort has eased. Initially it was a very strange feeling.

The incision in the front has steri-strips holding it closed, and there are a couple of tender spots there. Rolling out of bed has been what I’ve been doing for months, so that wasn’t too hard to learn to do. The back incision sometimes bothers me, as I spent a lot of time in bed sleeping. That one you can feel, so I’ve noticed I can’t really move much at night.

I wear a back brace 24/7 that I love. It’s not required to wear while you’re sleeping, but it’s so comfortable that I like to have it on. 

Once home:

I returned home Sunday afternoon and moved straight into my office where there is a day bed. It’s lower than my master bedroom so easier to get in and out of. The room isn’t that large, but my dogs joined me in there, and the bed is loaded with pillows to help support me. I spent most of the first week resting and watching some television. I didn’t attempt to get on the computer because I was still medicated. By the end of the week, I was actually considering moving from the walker to a cane, and then the sciatica in my calves started. The pain was so intense at first we thought I may have developed blood clots. To check that out, I put my TENS unit on the area, and the tingles went straight down to my toes, so I know it was nerve related. I had heard on other sites that it was not uncommon to have sciatica flare up. After all, they were jiggling my nerves and clearing the pinched nerves that had been so inflamed for over a year. I imagine it’s going to take some time to heal up. I went back to my walker immediately.

My friend, Kathy, brought me in to see my surgeon on Tuesday the 18th, and he said everything looked great. I mentioned the problem with my legs. He was a bit stumped and told me to keep an eye on it. I promised I would.

 On Thursday, September 20th, I rolled out of bed and fell, landing straight on my butt. My legs had completely given out. I felt funny, because I was one of those ladies saying “I’ve fallen and can’t get up!”. Unfortunately, my middle daughter had already left for school, so it was just my youngest (who was still asleep), so it was up to me to manage to get up. I did after a few moments, and I ended up being okay. It was just a good reminder to make sure I’m moving slowly and not doing too much.

I have had many people come to visit me during the day and keep an eye out on me. It’s been very helpful, and the amount of kindness everyone has shown me has brought me to tears many times. A special thank you goes out to Kathy, Michelle, Jenny, Yvette, Naomi, Rocky, Megan, Betsy, Kristi and DeOnna for wonderful dinners, rides and support!

I also wanted to make a mention for the beautiful flowers and cards I’ve received. Again, they have brought me to tears (I think I’m just not used to people being so nice to me, LOL). Thank you to Danny and Michelle, my family, Linda, Ilil, Christine, Karen and Cheri. Also there is a thank you to Belinda, Vickie, Linda and Ilil again, Rosie, Joe, Stephen, Margaret, David, Mary, Elissa. You all have been so wonderful. 

So the recovery is coming along, slowly but surely. My surgeon says I should be able to start driving in two more weeks, although I can only stay on local roads for 10-15 minute drives. I’m hopeful the sciatica in my legs will ease soon too.

It has been eighteen days now. While I’m still using my walker, I am feeling overall better. Shannon had her Homecoming dance last night. I released my walker and allowed her to support me for this photo. If not for the sciatica in my calves, I feel I’d already be using the cane. So I’ll give it another couple of weeks to strengthen up, and I start physical therapy after two months. I’m finally on the road to a pain-free life again, yay!

Lastly, an especially giant thank you to my two younger children. They have been exceptionally helpful and understanding and I don’t know how I’d be getting through all this without them. While my oldest is in college, she’s been checking in on me every day, and that reminds me what a great family I truly do have. Thank you all for your support and well wishes! 

Some of you know that I’ve been laid up for over a year now with back problems. Go figure, my active lifestyle apparently was the cause of it. Who would have thought that when you remain active and healthy you end up
blowing out your back? Well, that’s what happened to me in July 2011. I went to bed one night and woke up the next morning to fall on my face when my leg gave out on me. Anyone who’s limped down this road will understand when I say that you can’t stand for more than a few minutes without your muscles clamping down and spasming, and you can’t sit for more than a couple of minutes because it’s so painful. It’s a good thing I work from home, because the only somewhat comfortable position is to lie flat with my legs bent (try straightening them and you’ll hear me screaming all the way to Alaska!). That’s the life you live when you have a back injury, and I would never wish this on anyone, honestly. It's a difficult and disabling injury that is incredibly difficult to manage.

Oh, we tried everything, flipping the mattress, sleeping in another room, putting a board under the mattress, and building “The Great Wall of China” in my bed with pillows. Guess what? None of that worked. By November, I could barely stand and the discomfort was so great there were times that I would just cry. I spent hours pacing the house like a caged animal trying to escape from the pain, and it was months that I had not felt my baby toe because of the sciatica that raged down both legs. I finally broke down and visited my primary care physician, who promptly sent me for an MRI, and lo and behold, we found out I had problems with two of my discs. L4/L5 bulges, not too bad but enough to need surgery, and L5/S1 had collapsed (see photo on left below). They told me what I already knew: your disc is pinching your spinal cord, ouch! Yeah, so fix me, please! 
 
Two rounds of steroids, a nerve blocker called Gabapentin, muscle relaxants, and physical therapy were prescribed. That’s the standard operating procedure for most back problems I suppose. I was definitely a trooper, braving the intense pain in my back while driving to go to my physical therapy appointments religiously, hoping with all my heart that I could fix it without surgery. I’ve been making it through my day with a strong painkiller that made me so loopy in the beginning that I thought I would lose my mind. Guess what? It didn’t work. And my goodness, if you’ve ever had back problems, you know what I mean when I say it’s so unbelievably discouraging. I mean, my house looks like a torture chamber now: bottles of mind-altering substances, a rack, and a bed of
nails. OK, honestly, it’s actually my medications, an acupressure mat and of course my trusty but huge inversion table. None of those have worked so far, which make you wonder if you’re going to be confined to the house for the rest of your life. 

In late-February I tried injections. I must admit that I love my pain management doctor. He’s amusing, optimistic, and entertaining. But it’s frightening to lie in a sterile room with your butt aiming to the sky and an x-ray machine focused on your spine while needles are injected into that narrow, sensitive area that holds the key to independent movement. We tried four injections to no avail. The second one did wonders for loosening up the muscles that were clamped down because of my ‘guarding’, but still the pain didn’t go away (how could it, when I have so much material pressing on the spinal cord?). The best part of the injections was the numbing agent that they used that would make my back pain go down to a four long enough for me to return home. 
 
In June I finally contacted a surgeon. I broke down and realized that I couldn’t go on like this because I was hurting too much, hadn’t had a good night’s sleep in a year and nothing else was working. Oh yeah, I called, and then the waiting began. Guess what? You need a new MRI, the other one is now eight months old. Great. So I did go in and get a new one, along with x-rays of my back to see why my range of motion was so horrible. I contacted two surgeons, and finally got in to see one with my new films. Imagine my surprise when I found out how intricate the surgery was going to be? I mean, I’ve spoken to a lot of people over the months who have told me to get the surgery because they’re up and walking in two days. I knew I was a fairly tough person, but boy
did this prove that all my whining was well worth it! Take that! 

I’m a lucky person in that my injury is in a common area, and the surgeries I’ll be undergoing are routine for my situation. That’s a relief. However, I was nearly bowled over when my surgeon told me I would be out of touch for 3-4 weeks, couldn’t start physical therapy for two months and wouldn’t be back to normal for 6-8 months. Even scarier is that I might not be driving for over a month! Whatever happened to two days up and walking around?

I guess I have to have two procedures done, that’s why. There are actually multiple issues to address, so there will be two surgeries completed. I’ll have an anterior lumbar interbody fusion (ALIF) using a plastic brace to fuse the two discs together and raise the collapsed disc (I hope I get my half inch back, everyone!). That procedure will be done by going in at my bikini line, pushing aside my intestinal sac and then inserting the brace into my spinal column once the collapsed material is removed. Then, I’ll be flipped over somehow (I really don’t want to know how, honestly) for a posterior fusion with bilateral foraminal decompression (PLIF) which will scrape away the bone spurs that are compressing my spinal cord and clean up the herniated material (see photo on right). In truth, I’m not sure which side comes first, but the plan is to complete both procedures at once. Oh, I hope so too. I just want it all done so I can start the road to healing. A sixty percent reduction in pain will at least let me get back on my feet, perhaps hike again, and my surgeon said that I might even be able to resume horseback riding in a year. Unfortunately it’s too late for my last horse, who’s moved on to a new home, but someday I may get back in the saddle. Now I wait.

So I’ll be offline for a time. I’m still planning on releasing Kat’s Last Chance in October as planned, but I probably will be catching up on tons of lost sleep for the first few weeks following surgery. Because these surgeries are so intimidating for us back sufferers, I will try to keep my readers informed and hopefully educate others about my personal experience during recovery, so I’ll try to keep the blog updated regularly. For now all I can say is the end of the road is in sight, and I for one am looking forward to getting my life back!

Please keep your fingers crossed and stay tuned!