Fifa At The Ten Month Mark
Hi, everyone -
It has been forever since I've been on the forum. Hope you all are well.
I have had two problems since surgery, both of which are getting better. All in all, I'm very happy I had the surgery and am VERY happy it is behind me! My ability to stand and walk is much improved postop, and standing and walking gets better every day, although I'm still not quite as active as I was before surgery. My activity level is no one's fault but my own. My work got behind while I was out, and it seems to be taking forever to get caught up again.
My main problem now, at ten months postop, is some nagging upper back/shoulder/neck pain. My surgeon, Dr. Buchowski at Wash U in St. Louis, doesn't want me to see a physical therapist where I live (Columbia, Missouri) so he has sent me to a physical therapist in St. Louis. She is wonderful and has helped me quite a bit. Since my fusion was all lumbar and low thoracic, it seems my upper body now doesn't know exactly where it is supposed to be in space. I have very little pain in the low back - I get twinges/grabbing if I move the wrong way (like if I forget precautions and twist or lean more than I should). This is just a sort of a grabbing tightness that goes away almost as soon as it happens...just a little reminder that I shouldn't have leaned or bent that far. (smiley) It is no big deal. As far as the neck and shoulders, it is almost like my shoulders are coming up toward my ears and that I'm sort of hunching forward in the upper back area. The therapist has given me exercises, which seem to help. I'm also supposed to start swimming again, but so far, I haven't been able to fit that into my schedule. I'm also getting massage therapy once a week, which is helping more than anything else I'm doing. However, it has been hard for me to lay flat on my back on the table. I haven't tried getting on my stomach and won't try that probably ever. I see the therapist again in October, so hopefully she will have more suggestions for me then. At that visit, we will work on my gait and my posture. I'm also going to order a "posture bra" to try and see if that helps. This upper back pain is now my biggest problem postop. I think some ibuprofen would help, but I can't have any of that until November at the one-year mark. This upper back pain started in earnest when I began spending more time at my desk at work. I've moved my monitors around and done everything I could do to make my work station ergonomic, but it hasn't helped much. The more I sit at my desk at work, the worse the pain is. Hopefully, we'll find a solution to this soon. It is annoying and unexpected.
The other problem postop is a bit harder to explain, but happily seems to be going away. I've had quite a bit of cognitive difficulties in the last few months. When I returned to work full-time in April, I found that I couldn't do simple math in my head anymore, and I also found that my reading comprehension was pretty bad. I found myself staring at an e-mail and knowing that I needed to read it, and it was like my eyes just scanned the lines but the words didn't sink in. My brain knew that I had a task..."read this e-mail," and so my eyes just followed it line by line, but my brain was off in Tahiti or somewhere. I made a lot of mistakes when I first went back to work, which really upset me. I was easily distracted, too. I would start to respond to an e-mail, and then another e-mail would come in. I would open the second e-mail and start responding to it, ignoring the first e-mail I had opened and started answering. In short order, I had six or eight e-mails open at the bottom of the screen. More than once, I put a reply to one e-mail in a different open e-mail. It was terribly difficult to multitask, and although it has gotten a lot better in the last month or so. I don't know if it is actually better or if I'm coping with it better.
The cognitive stuff scared the living crud out of me. I hadn't thought about any brain trouble after surgery. My preop worries were all about the physical things. I thought I was losing/had lost my mind. When I saw my surgeon in August, I told him that the cognitive stuff was really distressing me more than the physical recovery. He said to me, "Does it feel like early Alzheimer's?" I said, "YES! That is exactly it!" He said, "It is because you had such big surgery. Everyone has this." I began to cry and didn't ask him any more questions, but have a few for when I see him again in November at the one-year mark. I don't know if he meant "big surgery" as in the amount of time I was under anesthesia, the amount of rods/screws, or maybe the amount of pain medications that I took until I finally quit them in May. I had never heard of people still having difficulties with anesthesia effects months and months after surgery, but apparently it happens. Frankly, I think it was all the pain meds and muscle relaxants. Also, maybe it was/is because my brain was focused on healing to where it didn't have enough energy to think. (smiley) It might also have to do with nutrition. Who knows? All I know is that I haven't mentally quite felt like me again. Happily, this is MUCH better now.
I'm very happy with the results of surgery and wouldn't hesitate to do it again if I needed to. While my recovery has been slower than I would have like, it is what it is, and I feel better now than I have in probably 15 years or so. It is still hard for me to believe sometimes that I'm on the other side of this. What I know is that I couldn't have done it without the support I've had from all of you, and I thank you.
I'll try to post more frequently. I think of you all often - I have lots of catching up to do here now that I can read and absorb it better.
Oh, and someone sent me a private message about the bidet that we bought. I would be lost without it! I will post info publicly about what we bought and how we chose it. Yay - another poop thread! (LOL)
Love and hugs to you all!
Fifa
Hi, everyone -
It has been forever since I've been on the forum. Hope you all are well.
I have had two problems since surgery, both of which are getting better. All in all, I'm very happy I had the surgery and am VERY happy it is behind me! My ability to stand and walk is much improved postop, and standing and walking gets better every day, although I'm still not quite as active as I was before surgery. My activity level is no one's fault but my own. My work got behind while I was out, and it seems to be taking forever to get caught up again.
My main problem now, at ten months postop, is some nagging upper back/shoulder/neck pain. My surgeon, Dr. Buchowski at Wash U in St. Louis, doesn't want me to see a physical therapist where I live (Columbia, Missouri) so he has sent me to a physical therapist in St. Louis. She is wonderful and has helped me quite a bit. Since my fusion was all lumbar and low thoracic, it seems my upper body now doesn't know exactly where it is supposed to be in space. I have very little pain in the low back - I get twinges/grabbing if I move the wrong way (like if I forget precautions and twist or lean more than I should). This is just a sort of a grabbing tightness that goes away almost as soon as it happens...just a little reminder that I shouldn't have leaned or bent that far. (smiley) It is no big deal. As far as the neck and shoulders, it is almost like my shoulders are coming up toward my ears and that I'm sort of hunching forward in the upper back area. The therapist has given me exercises, which seem to help. I'm also supposed to start swimming again, but so far, I haven't been able to fit that into my schedule. I'm also getting massage therapy once a week, which is helping more than anything else I'm doing. However, it has been hard for me to lay flat on my back on the table. I haven't tried getting on my stomach and won't try that probably ever. I see the therapist again in October, so hopefully she will have more suggestions for me then. At that visit, we will work on my gait and my posture. I'm also going to order a "posture bra" to try and see if that helps. This upper back pain is now my biggest problem postop. I think some ibuprofen would help, but I can't have any of that until November at the one-year mark. This upper back pain started in earnest when I began spending more time at my desk at work. I've moved my monitors around and done everything I could do to make my work station ergonomic, but it hasn't helped much. The more I sit at my desk at work, the worse the pain is. Hopefully, we'll find a solution to this soon. It is annoying and unexpected.
The other problem postop is a bit harder to explain, but happily seems to be going away. I've had quite a bit of cognitive difficulties in the last few months. When I returned to work full-time in April, I found that I couldn't do simple math in my head anymore, and I also found that my reading comprehension was pretty bad. I found myself staring at an e-mail and knowing that I needed to read it, and it was like my eyes just scanned the lines but the words didn't sink in. My brain knew that I had a task..."read this e-mail," and so my eyes just followed it line by line, but my brain was off in Tahiti or somewhere. I made a lot of mistakes when I first went back to work, which really upset me. I was easily distracted, too. I would start to respond to an e-mail, and then another e-mail would come in. I would open the second e-mail and start responding to it, ignoring the first e-mail I had opened and started answering. In short order, I had six or eight e-mails open at the bottom of the screen. More than once, I put a reply to one e-mail in a different open e-mail. It was terribly difficult to multitask, and although it has gotten a lot better in the last month or so. I don't know if it is actually better or if I'm coping with it better.
The cognitive stuff scared the living crud out of me. I hadn't thought about any brain trouble after surgery. My preop worries were all about the physical things. I thought I was losing/had lost my mind. When I saw my surgeon in August, I told him that the cognitive stuff was really distressing me more than the physical recovery. He said to me, "Does it feel like early Alzheimer's?" I said, "YES! That is exactly it!" He said, "It is because you had such big surgery. Everyone has this." I began to cry and didn't ask him any more questions, but have a few for when I see him again in November at the one-year mark. I don't know if he meant "big surgery" as in the amount of time I was under anesthesia, the amount of rods/screws, or maybe the amount of pain medications that I took until I finally quit them in May. I had never heard of people still having difficulties with anesthesia effects months and months after surgery, but apparently it happens. Frankly, I think it was all the pain meds and muscle relaxants. Also, maybe it was/is because my brain was focused on healing to where it didn't have enough energy to think. (smiley) It might also have to do with nutrition. Who knows? All I know is that I haven't mentally quite felt like me again. Happily, this is MUCH better now.
I'm very happy with the results of surgery and wouldn't hesitate to do it again if I needed to. While my recovery has been slower than I would have like, it is what it is, and I feel better now than I have in probably 15 years or so. It is still hard for me to believe sometimes that I'm on the other side of this. What I know is that I couldn't have done it without the support I've had from all of you, and I thank you.
I'll try to post more frequently. I think of you all often - I have lots of catching up to do here now that I can read and absorb it better.
Oh, and someone sent me a private message about the bidet that we bought. I would be lost without it! I will post info publicly about what we bought and how we chose it. Yay - another poop thread! (LOL)
Love and hugs to you all!
Fifa
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