I FINALLY did it! *happy dance*

[fierceliketiger]

Hey all,
As I posted before my surgeon is a stickler for me walking...a LOT. TODAY, finally...for the FIRST TIME EVER...I made the 10 mile mark. WOO. He wanted me to walk 10 to 15 miles a day, though, now has admitted that he always gives "high" numbers because that makes people feel guilty when they only walk half a block and was stunned that I was actually trying to do it. He seemed happy when I was at 5 miles a few months ago, and did tell me to slow down for a few weeks when I was at 8 and having problems. After being at 5 miles a day for a bit, he told me to keep trying to increase it again.
So...today, I made the 10. I am strangely excited by this. Oh, and I wasn't dying when I got back! My feet were tired, I will admit that.

Also, I am getting married in 9 days. We are getting married in the smoky mountains and have plans to walk to a waterfall 3 miles into the park...6 miles round trip, and now I know that I should have no problem. I made sure to walk on uneven, sloping, and hilly terrain (as best as one can in Iowa) today to make sure that I could do it. :-)

Oh! And I am finally able to take less pain pills without feeling like I am being stabbed repeatedly. My surgeon did determine that though the fusion itself, the part that was causing the ongoing severe pain was probably the osteotomy site as well as some nerve endings that have now been sliced through 3 times (I had two lamentectomy/lipoma removals prior to the fusion). Good stuff to know.

Anyhow, that is my happy update for the month.

[debbei]

Fierce,

what an accomplishment. I have to say though, I think your surgeon is a BLEEPITY-BLEEP for telling people immediately post surgery to walk 15 miles. He should say what he really means. Seriously, it could cause some patients more harm than good if they REALLY tried to walk that far right after surgery. I must have misunderstood your earlier posts; I thought that you WERE walking 10-15 miles immediately.

Lately I've been walking between 4 & 5 miles on my 'long walk' days, and about 3 miles on a 'short walk' day. My long walk takes me a little over an hour. How long does 10 miles take for you?

Have a wonderful wedding, what an exciting time for you.

[Qikdraw]

That is a great accomplishment!

And congrats on the wedding! I hope you're going to put up a wedding picture for us too! :D

Brad

[fierceliketiger]

debbei- nope, I never got much further than 8 until today...unfortunately, not long after I typed out my post I realized that I was pretty badly sunburned. :-( Now I am just trying to figure out how to lighten it for the wedding pictures! 10 miles took me about 3 hours 40 minutes...I got a bit slow at the end. :-(
As for the surgeon, I am the first out of years and years of surgeries that actually tried to walk that much. So says his nurse.

Qikdraw- I will definitely post pictures...until then..I have a website you can check out of wedding stuff-
http://www.momentville.com/zacandsara

We are going to post pictures of the wedding and honeymoon there...hopefully as often as we can during the honeymoon.

[titaniumed]

Hi Tiger

15 miles per day at 2MPH average walking or hiking speed is about 7 hours. LOL Oh thats right, you are 23.

I have to agree with Debbe about Bleepity-Bleep, But it could be worse, like Oopity-Ooop.

Maxizoomdweeby is also another to watch out for......

Congratulations on your wedding!
Ed

[fierceliketiger]

Ed-
I haven't attempted 15 miles yet...thats so much walking. I can generally keep at a pretty good pace...3.5 or thereabouts...but at the end I slowed down a bit.

[titaniumed]

Just wanted to share one of our local trails with a reason to hike 15 miles. The flume trail is at Lake Tahoe, I've hiked it and biked it quite a few times. Its like 2000 feet above the lake and the views are fantastic! Its one of the best hikes in the US

Now everyone can see why I do not own a treadmill. LOL

Glacier National park is heaven also.

If anyone wants to come out here and experience this, come on out, lets go for a hike!

Hey Ed, where is the end?
"just around the next bend"
LOL

http://www.theflumetrail.com/

[loves to skate]

Hi fierceliketiger,
Wow! Never in my life have I walked 10 miles at one time; well maybe when I was a teenager. I could skate 10 miles with no trouble, but walking, my knees would be screaming. Skating is much lower impact in these old joints. Anyway, good for you and best wishes for your upcoming wedding. Are the Grandmothers going to be able to make it to you wedding?:D I had to walk through salt marshes to get to my Nephew's wedding on Race Point, in Provincetown, MA. Sand kind of ruins pantyhose when you walk on, it so I had to take them off. HaHa.:D

[fierceliketiger]

loves to skate-
well, I don't have any grandmothers who are still living. :( Of his grandparents, not a single one wanted to come. So, no...no grandparents. Actually, we were planning on getting married at Abrams Falls in the Smokies, and we changed it because its a 3 mile walk and our mothers threw giant fits about it. Abrams happens to be my fiance's last name...so it would have been pretty neat.
As it is...the wedding is less than a 2 minute walk from the car. Our mothers still complained.
The only ones coming are my brother, my mom, her boyfriend, his brother, his mom, and his dad. We have two receptions planned for later this summer, one in Iowa, one in Wisconsin, because neither side of our family would drive to the other place, and they DEFINITELY were against meeting in the middle. argh.


Ed-you have a much nicer walking area than I do! Our trail is less than a half block from my house, so in that sense I am lucky...but much less scenic than yours. I do enjoy the foxes, chipmunks, squirrels, and birds that live along it though.


It is raining today, so no walking for me. Aside from that, I have a terribly nasty sunburn. Wow. It hurts more than I thought a sunburn could. Its no fusion surgical pain, but it sure can make things uncomfortable. Luckily, I fade quickly, so it should be gone by next week...on the suggestion of a few family members I scheduled a spray tan session to "disguise" my "tank top tan lines". haha

[Susie*Bee]

Fierce-- just wanted to say that I'm really excited for you too, with your wedding coming up soooo soon! It sounds like it will be lovely! Then having two receptions later on will be nice too, so all those people who miss out on the beautiful wedding can at least celebrate with you too. We'll be thinking of you! And DO post a pic or two afterward, when you get a chance. :D

Sally-- had to laugh about you needing to take your nylons off. What a hoot! ;)

Ed-- sounds like a gorgeous hike. I love Tahoe-- it is the clearest lake I've ever seen-- have such memories of seeing clear down to the bottom with crystal clear water. But I also remember the cold! Those high mountain lakes can be chilly! We used to rent a cabin every year when I was a youngish teen, in June... before things warmed up a whole lot. But we were on the CA side of the lake, near Rubicon Point-- actually it was Meeks Bay. Are you familiar with that area? Ahhh... reminiscing is always fun. Take care!

[Qikdraw]

Qikdraw- I will definitely post pictures...until then..I have a website you can check out of wedding stuff-
http://www.momentville.com/zacandsara

We are going to post pictures of the wedding and honeymoon there...hopefully as often as we can during the honeymoon.

DURING the honeymoon? :eek: Not to be too indelicate... But honeymoons are NOT for posting pics up online. :D

One piece of advice, if I may, don't let your mothers take control of the wedding. We bowed down to pressure from my wife's mother and both of us regret it. So much so that my wife hated our wedding and she wants to do it again. This is your day, so do what you want to do.
Also, before the day of the wedding, make sure your fiance's pants fit. (mine didn't so I was married in pants that were unbuttoned :D ) Oh, and don't wear brand new shoes that you haven't broken in yet, my wife did and her feet were so sore she was almost crying.

Anyway, I hope your day is very special and that everything goes as planned.

Brad

[asccbodypro]

I just have to say that I was a relatively fit person prior to surgery and thought I would be walking right away with no issues and I can only walk from my drive way take a left walk to the end of the block, turn and walk to the other end of the block and then back to my drive way.

It really isn't far....I am frustrated that I felt better last week than this week. The 2nd Surgery was April 22. I know somedays are going to be good and some are not going to be so good. I am trying to keep positive but it's frustrating.

I really think my body is fighting against the brace. For those of you who wore a tlso brace how long was it before you were wearing your brace without it causing any pain....even though it was uncomfortable. I can't imagine anyone saying it's comfortable. GRRRRRRRRRRRRR! Well, enough of the pity party for now. Hope everyone out there is doing ok!

[Susie*Bee]

Susan-- I know it's frustrating and disappointing when recovery takes longer than what you think it should. I know I spent a lot of time in those first several months where I was either thinking I was doing pretty well, then would flip-flop and think "this is taking FOREVER!" -- the only thing I can say is that with the passage of time and with working at doing what you can, you will get better and stronger and more able. Sometimes I am very glad (in some ways) that I didn't find the forum until 5 months post op. I didn't know how others did, so I just had to go it on my own and not compare my recovery with anyone else's. I probably would have been very discouraged. Try to look back and see how far you've come since you were in the hospital and be glad of that.

As far as the TLSO brace goes-- I can't quite remember anymore, but I know I was uncomfortable for awhile, but then got used to it and it I know it gave me quite a bit of support and all, and then it was hard to "give it up" but that worked out too. I did need to get it adjusted right at the beginning because it hit tooo high in the armpit area, etc.

Hang in there. Go ahead and have a pity party when you need to-- that's part of recovery too. I've had plenty of them myself. Be easy on yourself.

[titaniumed]

Susie Bee-- Meeks bay is where I was launching my boats years ago. Its also the closest ramp to Emerald bay which is where I would frequently go. I also hiked all of that area years ago. Can you believe that its rated as one of the top 3 most scenic spots on earth? Its nice, I have my doubts about top 3.

I sold my last boat 13 years ago. Scoliosis and boating don't mix well. Scoliosis and cleaning the boat don't mix well. Scoliosis and making the bank payments don't mix well LOL

http://www.parks.ca.gov/?page_id=506

Susan-- With me as far as recovery time was concerned, I was a reader here for quite some time. I knew what it was going to take to recover and wasn't too worried since I had 12-18 months in my mind. In the early days of my recovery, it was like a survival mode that I was in and just took it one day at a time.

Slow and easy............. It took me 2 months to do a block of walking. At 3 months, I walked around Virginia City for 3 hours and had to sleep for 2 days. I took it real easy for the first 6 months as I wanted to know that I was fused. Like moving a jigsaw puzzle after the glue process, make sure its dry. I worked my muscles, but I did it at a pace that didn't exasperate or provoke any unpleasant feelings. After the slow non-linear scale of soft tissue building or adjustment, the volume knob can be turned up just a little more.

My doc knew I was an adrenaline junky and told me several times to just take it easy. I think that when I showed up for surgery with a broken shoulder, that tipped him off. Boy, was I whooped after surgery!

Time fly's fast you know. Before you know it, you will look back and think about those difficult times of recovery. It acts as a building block and hones or molds ones personality, to a greater degree. The appreciation for life without pain and the realization of the "fragility of human existence" is totally understood after major surgery. Life is fragile.

Imagine if all people had that understanding, the world would be a better place.

Tiger--The Smokies will be a blast! If you see Smokie, say hi for me.
Ed

[fierceliketiger]

Brad, lol. I won't be posting pictures of THAT. But we are walking/hiking the smokies, canoeing, going to dollywood, and seeing our niece and nephew in Kentucky. :-) We are working on keeping the mothers at bay...they have each caused some reception drama already.

Susan, I was so frustrated too. Prior to surgery I was walking as much as I am now (the surgeon told me it would help if I did), and felt like I had accomplished something grand when I made a half mile (my engineer fiance calculated how many laps I needed to take to make a 1/4 mile, 1/2 mile, full mile, etc, and posted a sign for me) in one day at 2 weeks...and by one day I mean one FULL day. Litterally, I would do 20 laps every few hours or so.
As for the TLSO, it was a GIANT pain in the butt. When I finally got it remade to fit it stopped hurting really...but that could just be that it caused less pain than the one that I had before (that was really not made for me at all). It did cause some discomfort always. I was glad to be "done" with it.