Something Beats Nothing Every Time

Friday
Pain 8, Mobility 2
I woke up early, pain about the same and have already been ambling around the house trying to get some energy into my legs. It’s really hard when every move you make causes intense pain and yet your desire to get back to normal requires that you do so. I haven’t been doing much to be honest, I walked another 650m today but have yet to break 1km which I should already have done. Sadly I think I would have if it were summer and Tim Horton’s was my intended destination. That said, I am trying to keep going and plan on hitting that 1k before Sunday night. Friday was uneventful but I have scaled back on the pain killers since my biggest fear is a repeat of the addiction I suffered after my first surgery when I was given enough percocets to fill a Christmas Smarties container (yes the 3ft one). I was fortunate that I went to Australia but had to endure 5 days of withdrawal which in retrospect was almost as hard as the surgery recovery itself. I just checked and it was 39 days after my surgery that I went to Australia. That means I was on percocet almost constantly for over a month. That’s terrifying. In comparison to my second surgery where on day 4 I was already walking to Tims and testing out my ability to lift weights again (I know, probably not smart but one extreme to another seems to be how I do things).

I am not one to compare since this time I have had double the surgery as last time but on this day after surgery 2 I was feeling so good… well, this is what I wrote…

By the evening, I felt so much better that I decided to go to the gym to see the girls and have them explain in their own words what happened at competition. All I can say is that is went badly. Very very badly. A hard to swallow end to a very challenging day.

As a side note, this is a day that has lived in infamy with Liza, Elissa and me. It has been five and a half years and we still talk about that evening. We talked about their competition results and what had happened at the previous weekend (my only missed competition in 15 years coaching) and let’s just say it wasn’t a pleasant exchange of viewpoints.

Saturday
Pain 4 Mobility 4

I am definitely moving around much better and I am happy to report that I haven’t taken any painkillers today and it’s already 130pm. The reason for that isn’t great because when I went to the washroom this morning I was shocked to see Homer Simpson in the mirror. My face and hands were almost completely yellow yet my eyes where still bright white. This is a very disturbing thing to see when you aren’t really awake and I decided I would check WebMD where everything is cancer to see what was wrong. Oddly enough I seem to remember this happening to me before but I can’t remember when. I am working with the assumption that due to lack of food and drink that my system is being overwhelmed by byproducts of my medications and the bilirubin count is skyrocketing. Although cleansing isn’t a thing, your body does require liquid to process anything through the kidneys and liver and I think that trying not to drink too much in order to avoid going to the bathroom wasn’t a quality decision. It is now after 130pm and I feel like my colour is pretty normal and even the yellowing of my hands is almost completely gone.

The benefit of all of this is that I am not completely disabled while not taking any morphine. I can’t say I am conformable in any way but the pain is manageable save that few seconds getting out of bed which is basically hell on earth. Here’s a fun experiment for you all, get someone to put 23 staples in your back and see how much fun it is to do some yoga..:)

I am going to try to get out and walk this afternoon, determined to hit my 1000m goal today but although my confidence is high my realistic expectation is that I will get to about 700 and call it a day. I did manage to make $500 on selling some old snow tires so today has been a good day in some respects and my mood is pretty good considering it’s a snowy landscape outside and I feel a little trapped.

It is very odd going into major surgery feeling OK. Usually I am in agony on a gurney or at the very least struggling to be mobile enough to move around This time however things are different. The injury I sustained just 2 short months ago was serious enough that another incident will give me permanent damage in most of my right leg. So it is with understandable trepidation that I set off on this journey once again.

In reviewing my last posts about the surgery I find that it was too much writing and not enough fact. I am starving for details about how I felt and what I am going to expect in the coming weeks. So this time I will try to expand more on what I am feeling and how my progress is going.

I sat in the most bizarre waiting room in any hospital in the world, remembering that 5 years ago I felt exactly the same. If you have never been to the surgical waiting room at St Mikes it’s a mixture of baroque paintings and classical decorations that make you feel like you are on a set of a period film rather than waiting for surgery. As they wheel you down the hallways to the OR it becomes even more odd with pictures of small children petting cats and oil painted landscapes fit for a stately home. The waiting is the worst part, hanging about just napping and wasting time until the surgical suite is yours. I sent about 4 hours on a bed waiting to be taken but once they came for me that familiar feeling of the bottom of the initial hill on a rollercoaster comes to mind. There was no turning back, terrified or not there was no getting off the ride and as the car crested the hill the plastic mask went over my face and a tear rolled down my cheek.

The relief on waking was something I will never forget. This time I had been having doubts, probably from my advanced age, that things might not go OK but as the fog lifted from my brain I came to the realization that I was in fact still alive. I revelled in this miracle of a revelation for about 3 seconds until I felt the first hit of pain. It has been a long time since I have felt pain like that, and other than the nerve pain of actual spinal cord damage there is nothing quite as excruciating as the pain of a deep incision in your body. I lay very still for as long as I could stirring only to try to drink or to soothe my throat with ice. The intubation had made my lips and throat raw and the surgery had left me incapable of any movement without tsunamis of pain washing over me. I drifted in and out of sleep for the rest of the day with Alyssa the nurse managing my pain and my hydration for me. Nicole and Elyse turned up right after I woke and it was really nice to see familiar faces and eventually taste some real food and some coffee. My memory of the rest of that day are sketchy at best but I do remember being frustrated at not being allowed to try to stand or walk.

Recovery Day 1 – Wednesday
Pain 10 Mobility 1

Wednesday was discharge day and although things moved quickly it was a long and involved process to get out of the hospital. I had to get assessed by the physio who, by the way, was the very same lady as 5 years ago. My ability to walk confirmed and my desire to leave increasing I managed to get dressed and be ready for the long walk to the car. What I can say is that I am glad I was asleep for the surgery because the car ride home was probably what it would’ve felt like. Every bump, every swerve every turn and braking sent bolts of pain through me and it was an excruciating 45 minutes until we were in Aurora at which point I was able to look out of the window and see… snow. Seriously? Snow. The rest of the day was spent in bed or walking gently around the kitchen and family room trying to get my balance and strength back. Nicole was kind enough to go get me some supplies from the health store including a grabby tool and a bed bottle since it is still a very involved and excruciating process to get up from bed. Most of the day was spent watching TV in bed trying to get used to any position that reduced my pain and trying to remember not to cross my legs or twist my body at all. Let me tell you it’s hard to be still at the best of times… The basics are this, I can’t move my back at all, I have to remain straight and aligned at all costs. I can’t bend, twist, rotate, lean or contort in any direction otherwise I feel like my staples are going to explode. It is one thing to keep your back straight while lifting but it is a whole other game to remain completely still while trying to do things. The day passed in a haze of morphine and sleep but I am still waiting for the first dreaded trip to the bathroom. I haven’t really been eating so I am not entirely surprised it hasn’t happened but there are a couple of things at play. Morphine is known to cause constipation and as of yet I don’t have my stool softener which has me frankly terrified in case the need arises to go. So I am not eating. I don’t really need to since I am bed bound most of the time but that will pass and the details I will likely not share here.

Recovery Day 2 – Thursday
Pain 8 Mobility 3

I am definitely getting better at moving around. My confidence in my mobility is increasing and I am getting better are moving while not moving if that makes sense. The big news today was that I was able to get some pans on and go for a walk. Even though it was freezing cold I still managed about 500m outside discovering that I need new gloves int he process. The walk was slow and painful but I was happy with my progress since my last recovery journal (which was luckily in the summer) had me walking on day 2 also. Since this was a slightly more involved surgery I would expect to be a bit behind but if I can walk again on Friday I think I will be really happy. The walking itself is very slow and I took my cane although I didn’t need to use it. However by the time I got back home my leg and back were in pain and I was ready to get back to bed. It wasn’t bad for my first outing and gave me a lot of confidence in my recovery however I also know the past 2 surgeries I have had a relapse which I am desperate to avoid this time. So I will be sensible and cautious and move at a human pace in order to prevent any unnecessary injury. Nicole and Elyse have been out and about most of the day which is probably best since I have 3 furry guardians looking after me right now. I have everything I need, I just know it is a matter of time until I improve to a significant degree. I am optimistic but impatient…

December 31 2002
April 24 2013
November 12 2018

This coming week is a big one. I am selling some snow tires tomorrow morning so that’s nice but then I have to go to the hospital one last time to drop off my signed release and confirm my exit from my Senior Network Engineer position. After that it is to my family doctor to check my blood pressure and refill as many of my medications as I can in case I can’t make it back for a few months. Once that is done it’s off downtown yet again for anesthesia testing before my surgery on Tuesday.

Then it’s the big day. I am at St Mike’s at 6am in case there are any early openings with the schedule so I can get in as early as possible. After that who really knows what may happen but I am committed to document my recovery this time since my recollection of my last surgery HERE is a bit foggy by now. I do remember that my recovery from surgery 2 was significantly better than after surgery 1, something that I will try to expand on a little.

My injury history started at age 14. I was playing rugby and since I played as a prop I was on the front row of the scrum and habitually ended up at the bottom af a large pile of humans as the scrum collapsed. This time however I took a nosedive into the floor and was folded in half like a playing card which caused significant injury to my lower back. This was to be the first in a long line of disc ruptures that would eventually lead me to having my first surgery. It was a delightful time of life, being a kind of fat kid at 14 wearing what was essentially a corset for half a school year was great. At least I was big enough that bullying was never really a factor but then again since when did that stop kids bagging on each other…

Fast forward to my early 30s. My back had never really been an issue for the 16 years since that rugby injury but I should have known that in the end my ego and my arrogance would catch up with me. I remember it vividly, it was October 22 1998 and I was new at my job at the hospital. I was recently 30 and my ego was still as out of control as it was in my late teens. I had been doing leg press at the gym and stupidly thought that 12 plates a side would be an attainable goal. I had done 10 a side before, a total of 950lbs but this was to be a new record for me, 1130lbs and the congratulations and plaudits from nobody since nobody cared. In my mind I assumed that I was the coolest guy in the world but in reality I came to understand over the years that in fact nobody cares, nobody is watching and admiring and in fact most people are so wrapped up in their own ego maniacal lives that their only concern is the fleeting glances they give themselves in the mirrors. The following is what I wrote after the fact (which is why I have kept journals for 35 years now…)

I sat under the ego trip I had maniacally built upon the leg press and with one fluid motion the weight sank to my glutes with the delightful popping of cartilage and bone being compressed like an old scrap car. Then came the pain, as the surgical instrument entered my skin, exposing the spine to the elements I knew it was over for the day. The steel clamps twisted my spinal column into a knot of twitching pulsating nerve ends, the searing pain engulfed me as the nerves were stretched, strand by strand around the instrument then like spaghetti from a pan, they elastically snapped apart from each other, the ends left dangling. I crawled out from under the stack of weight and began methodically removing the plates. Stumbling down the stairs I limped my path back to the lockers knowing the heaven and hell that awaited me there. The hot tub and the socks.

I had endured some back issues before, slight pain, localized and never radiating down my legs but this was far, far different. It would still be 4 more years until I went for my first surgery but that 4 years was peppered with the same issues, my back would go out I would suffer incredible pain for a week while laying on the floor trying to recover. I didn’t know what to do, what would help or how to make myself any better and if you do as much research as you can nowadays you won’t find much online that is any different. Eventually I discovered Arthrotec, something that would take my recovery window down from a week to 2 days and enable me to get back to life with much greater haste. As time went along the issues cropped up more and more frequently from once every 6 months to every couple and then each month. It was at that time that the big problem happened that led me to surgery 1. Sadly there was no big event, my back was sore, had been sore for a while and then one day I was unable to walk. Sadly I believed that it would only be a matter of time until I was better regardless of the fact that I now had radiating pain down my leg again. It was Christmas season so I was determined to rest over the holiday and be back good as new in the New Year. The pain got worse, my back went out again and I lost a large amount of mass in my leg. Waiting was a decision that I regret to this day. New Years Eve 2002 I went into surgery and spent the next 3 months regretting my delay.

I spent most of my time on the couch imagining that rest was the key to success. It is not. If you ever have back surgery let me tell you 1 inalienable truth… Mobility is healing. Walking is the best thing you can do no matter how slow or laboured. Had I known back then what I know now I would have been up every day walking as much as possible but instead I ended up with an inequality in my healing due to the amount of time spent on my side watching TV. It sickens me to think of it now.

I am going to publish this now, it is day 1 of recovery and my adventures down memory lane will have to wait.

My back has been sore for a few weeks. It started at night when I would wander to the washroom in the dark and sit so that I wouldn’t pee on the dog. When I stood up I would get a sharp twinge in the base of my spine on the right, an all too familiar pain that usually indicates an oncoming storm of pain and medication. It didn’t get any worse, I spent weeks with a new pain that I wasn’t too familiar with, a shooting pain but with no radiation down my leg. On Thursday night, all that changed. During the week I had twisted getting out of bed and the pain had become worse and despite my taking my painkillers and very strong anti inflammatories (diclofenac) I was unable to get the pain to stop. Friday morning, of course the day Nicole was out of town at a conference, I woke up and as I stood up the familiar 50,000 volt bolt of lightning went from my back to my feet. This was no ordinary back outage, this was unfamiliar in the degree of pain and immediate lack of mobility. I am not ashamed to say I lay back on the bed and cried, partly due to the frustration of my body failing me again and partly because the pain was so intense I couldn’t breathe.

This is something I never wanted Elyse to see, but she had a front row seat to my pain and it visibly shook her. She was very good to fetch my phone and my medication and after taking my pills I lay there waiting for one of three things. First for the pain to subside, even partly, enough so I could stop sobbing and control my breathing. Second for Nicole to come home so I could call an ambulance and get to a hospital. Third if necessary for death to stop the pain that consumed me. I am not suicidal by any means and I have, thanks to my back issues, and extraordinary tolerance for pain but this was a whole new level of agony that I hadn’t experienced before. Not only did I feel like I had a knife in my spine but I felt like I had acid running through my veins, burning my leg from the inside out, igniting every nerve producing a concerto of pain orchestrated for the sole function of creating a hell on earth. As time passed the pain got worse, Nicole got home and called the medics and once they arrived I admit I snapped. I couldn’t handle the pain, it was simply too much. I panted like a dog on a hot summer day while shaking like I was being electrocuted. I went in and out of consciousness, they were unable to give me any more pain killers due to the percocet I had already taken, thankfully at the hospital the story was a different one.

I don’t really remember the ride, the medic was trying to be as encouraging as he could while trying to keep me conscious. It must have been quite a sight seeing someone of my size crying like a baby, sobbing uncontrollably and shouting what I assume was utter nonsense about not feeling my leg and not wanting to be paralyzed. Things get more hazy as we got to the hospital, as usual the nurses were shocked at my tolerance for painkillers and after the equivalent of 40mg of morphine they left me in the hallway to settle down. I was given hydromorphone and something called ketorolac trometh which apparently is an anti inflammatory that will put even diclofenac to shame. I have to say that it worked in quite an incredible fashion. Fast forward to the next day at home and I have no pain in my back. I don’t know if that is the amount of morphine flowing through my veins or the fact that the impingement itself is gone but if it is the latter then that’s not an anti inflammatory, that is a miracle in pill form.

The rest of the day is a morphine tinted haze, I lay at home drifting in and out of consciousness contemplating why and how this had happened and trying to imagine the next steps the most obvious of which would be another trip to the hospital for my third spinal surgery. As of now, Sunday, I can walk carefully with my cane, the pain has returned to my leg but as of yet not to my back itself. The nerve pain in my leg is significantly different than any time in the past which indicates that the damage suffered by the nerve is worse then any previous time. Whereas in the past I have lost feeling in my shin below the knee, now the sensation includes my adductors / groin, all my upper thigh muscles and my knee itself.

I am not sure what the next steps will entail but what I do know is that I need an MRI to confirm if the bone has grown back and then a decision as to what type of surgery I should have. I am still of the mind that initially I should have had a fusion done, I think it would have prevented any of this follow up incident and if I have the choice I think this time that is what I will push for. I can’t have another surgery  another 10 years from now and I can’t live with this pain.

As an aside, my blood pressure issues are well documented and when they took my blood pressure at the hospital they medic warned me it would be a little high due to the stress of the pain but even he wasn’t expecting 208/101. Just as the woman at the blood donor clinic was panicked by what she saw the medic did the same and immediately informed the doctor of the reading. As far as I can tell that is about as close to a stroke or a heart attack as you can get without your organs actually exploding.

Gives a whole new meaning to a broken heart…