Finally Home

Hey there, sweet welcome home knowing your son is doing fine must be a relief. It took 5 months for my fusion to actually show on X-ray, so patience, be kind to yourself. Rest, and walk that's my advise and for goodness sakes do not lift anything, even though you will be tempted to try.
Nice to have you back on HW.

Hello Matt! Good to see that you are finally home and starting to post again. We all have been checking here on a daily basis for updates on you, as we knew you struggled there for a while with lung problems.

I don't know if you realize it or not, but in your update here, you did not once mention your back pain or much about your fusion, and I find that amazing and a good sign. Of course I know your still hurting, but the fact that you did not say anything about it…seems to say that things must be going better for you now.

Above all your a great father, and anxious to get back to those duties! Enjoy those years as they grow up quickly…very quickly! I hope your following the surgeons orders to a T there…it's important to do so. I'm sure he said that walking a few times a day is needed as part of the fusion process. My only advice is of you are out walking…please take a cell phone with you, as you may feel pretty good for the first half of your walk…and then all of the sudden your out of steam and feeling pretty weak. Make them small walks, and walking in your house is recommended until you are a little more stable on your feet.

Stay on top of the pain meds as well, and keep one by your bed out of reach of the little one of course. Stool softeners may come in pretty handy as well, and if you can get a chair/potty lift type seat with arm rest on it……it will be a blessing more than you know. I have been there, I know!

Sweats and slippers work pretty well…so forget tieing shoes and or jeans for now….you will get there in a few weeks.

If you have any questions, feel free to ask our members or you can email me as well….I will be happy to share any tips I can think of.

Most importantly!…a fusion takes a long time to heal,...so BE PATIENT! You're a Fusion member now…so Welcome to the club!

Take care, and again we are glad to see you back. You may even have a bit of time for memory work now!

SE

Hi SE, I really didn't want to say a whole lot about the fusion side, not much good news to tell on that end yet. The pain is relatively controlled for now, and my PM thought she'd be brilliant and send me home with 30mg ms-Contin every 8 hours, with my previously prescribed different levels of oxycodone for BT, it's all just an experiment to see if the extended release will work in my system at all with the gastric bypass. It actually is having some very good positive benefits, I can feel a major difference between the raw pain, and the pain with the ms-contin, so I'm pretty satisfied so far, I just didnt want to start this kind of stuff this early on until my pain levels level off and are more consistant- still clinging onto the hope that they will go away, but the surgeon said that will never happen.

I guess I never did give the rundown on the actual procedure, so here's what they did: first they performed the anterior fusion from a lateral, or sideways approach (XLIF), it does virtually the same as the old ALIF, using a titanium cage to hold the bonegraft and to maintain the hieght in the old disc space after the disc is removed, but rather than install the associated hardware used with the XLIF, they proceeded to flip me and perform an ILIF or "Interlaminar Lumbar Instumented Fusion" which they did at the same level.

I'd encourage you to check out the videos on those two different procedures, but my surgeon said he wanted to perform both, though, I still haven't found out if he actually put in another bone graft when he did the ILIF, he implied that he was doing that part of the surgery so he could do the laminectomy, and because he liked the type of hardware used with that procedure, which is just a clamp on the two spinus process, with no screws, or holes or anything.

Well, sorry to disappoint, but the pain is very much alive in my back, and there is still no change in my left thigh yet. The XLIF used a brand new type of EMG, and it took almost as much time to set that up, as it did to do the surgery, me and the EMG monitor were in the OR for an hour before anyone else got in there, just getting all the pads, wires, and needles put in place. But anyways, she said there was no change in the lack of signal to that thigh, even after the surgeon had the disc evacuated, but this time, they said that the nerve might actually heal, but that can lead to it's own problems, and they said it could take years to see any change there if I ever do.

Well, like I said, not much good to report yet on the fusion side of things. The pain front is always changing, but hopefully, I'll have good news on all that stuff within a few months.

…Matt, you really do sound good here!…..give it a few weeks, and I bet your going to do very well overall. Remain positive, and I believe you are…keep it up!

SE

So glad to hear that you made it home, Matt.

Take it easy and dont lift at all.

We are pulling for you. Keep checking in with us when you feel up to it.

Welcome home

Betsey

Hey Chartreux, I found out last week just how mean those xray techs can be, I had the same one coming to my room each morning, waking me up with his giant portable xray machine, which I still cant figure out for the life of me why, each time, he had to pull my back brace off, and sit me up at a perfect 90% angle, and put this giant board behind my back. The first time he did it was wednsday afternoon, so maybe a day after my surgery, and no real pain relief either. That's probably the first time in my life that I am truly grateful that I did not have a weapon in my hand, not sure why; but he just kept on raising the back of the bed despite my screams for him to stop, finally got his attention when my mom grabbed his earlobe and turned him around with it, she doesn't like being woken up at 6am for anything, so Im shocked that she let him live.

Yeah anyways, I got a little bit of pepper spray left from a bottle that I used on my brother a month ago or so, I'll be bringing that with me to my next appointment to see an xray person, or I'll bring my mom, but that might just be cruel and unfair to the xray tech. Although I also have a walking cane with a 2 foot sword inside the shaft, but I don't ever take that away from the house, my dad got it for me as a gag gift, but that sword (nor the laws on carrying a conceled weapon in California) is not a toy or joke at all, it's the real mccoy, only one edge like a saber, but gracious is that thing sharp, I'm sure a lot of folks on here would love to have a walking cane like that with them, just for the added piece of mind lol.

Oh yeah, forgot to add, I didnt find out until after like 3 rounds of that xray on the bed thing, that the jackle could have just taken me down stairs, to the actual radiology dept. and allowed me to stand up while taking the xrays, and save me a lot of pain, but that guy really was an errogant, sadistic, jerk who didnt care.

Post Edited (2y4t) : 9/12/2012 8:54:39 PM (GMT-6)