Back Rehab in Arizona

December 1, 2009

OK, everyone, I know you are probably waiting to hear how my story ends. Will I be in continuous back pain even though I know where it is coming from or will I find a way to minimize the pain and go on with my life? Here goes!

When I came home from the three weeks of rehabilitation in Chicago, I knew that I was going to have to make some drastic changes. My life with my husband was beyond repair. All we did when we were together was fight. This made my back pain worse because all I could think about was how unhappy I was.

The second week after coming home from Chicago, I made the decision to move to Tucson, Arizona! Yes, you’re right! The decision came out of the blue. The winter weather made my back hurt and every day I tried to feel better to no avail. That’s it! I have to move to a warmer dryer climate to get rid of the pain and get stronger psychologically. When I told my husband I was moving to Tucson, he was very upset. I tried very hard to explain that our marriage was hurt beyond repair and I needed to go somewhere to heal. He couldn’t and didn’t understand. This is another story that I will definitely tell, but not today!

Anyway, by February 15th, I was packed and on a plane to Tucson with $500 in my pocket, a suitcase full of clothes, and a heavy duty pain in my back.

I called a friend, who had moved to Tucson to go to school, to pick me up at the airport. Strange, I can’t remember his name right now. He picked me up, brought me to his house that he shared with 2 other guys. I stayed a few weeks, just long enough to find a job and a place of my own. Winter in Tucson is not very cold for people used to Midwest winters; however, for Tucsonans, winter coats, long pants, and sneakers instead of flip flops were the uniform of the day.

Right after moving into my own place, I started walking to strengthen my legs and back muscles. Long hours on my feet in my chosen profession as a nurse was not considered exercise. Every day before and after work I walked for 20 minutes. Walking every day built up my muscles, but I made more progress when the weather started getting warmer.

During the middle of the day, I went across the street to the high school and started walking around the quarter mile track. After awhile, I started to jog slowly. I was definitely not a runner. I could only jog one quarter of a mile at a time. By the time school was out in June, I was walking/jogging 3 miles every day. My back pain was actually getting better. My life was full of work, exercise, new friends and my back was feeling better. A miracle!

I couldn’t believe it, but it was true! My back was actually better. Before I did my exercises every day I stretched my muscles thoroughly, did the walking/jogging faithfully, and kept my spirits cheerful.

If I can impart to you anything from my own story, I would like for you to realize that you too can take your chronic pain, no matter where it is, from severe to tolerable by making some positive changes in your life. One very important part of your healing is going to be the other aspects of your life that are causing you stress and making the pain worse. I had to leave my marriage; hopefully, you won’t have to do anything that drastic to change your life for the positive.

I’m here for each of you out there with any type of chronic pain.  If I can help you in any way please comment on any article in the blog and leave your contact information.  God Bless all people that are dealing with chronic pain.

By Diane | Posted in Chronic Back Pain With A Twist, The Power of Education | Tagged , , | Comments (0)

Back Surgery – Should I or Shouldn’t I?

November 30, 2009

To continue with the article written the other day about my personal chronic pain issue, I had been conservatively treating a very nagging painful condition that was now causing numbness and tingling in my left foot. Having grown up in the Western Medicine genre, I thought the only possible alternative left was surgery, if I could find the appropriate surgeon to do it.

At the time, I knew the local neurosurgeon, so I made an appointment. He was very careful with his examination, doing every known test including the lumbar myelogram (what an experience). This doctor was so thorough, he even called in a second opinion. Based on the second neurosurgeon’s opinion, surgery was finally scheduled. Great! I was very relieved. Finally, the pain was going to be history (so I thought).

A few days after being examined by the second neurosurgeon, my surgeon did the procedure. Nowadays, people having procedures similar to the one I had in October 1974, are going home the same day. I stayed in the hospital for a week. When I went home, I recuperated for a few short weeks and went back to work definitely against my doctor’s orders. One very important thing I want to tell anyone who is contemplating back surgery is Don’t Go Back to Work too soon!

I put emphasis on not going back to work too soon because this could ruin the good results of your surgery. A day or two after going back to work, I pivoted on one foot with a heavy tray of instruments in my hand and the pain I felt in my back was excruciating. I thought the pain would subside with a little rest, so I took a couple of sick days and stayed in bed, to no avail.

Meanwhile, I went back to work. The pain I felt was not excruciating anymore, it was just nagging, burning, and sometimes throbbing. What a deal! The pain I had after the surgical procedure was worse than before. How could that be?

I went back to the neurosurgeon and explained what had happened to bring the pain back. He was very stern because he had told me after the procedure not to go back to work until he released me. However, with my household finances the way they were at the time, my family needed the money. That is what I told him-we really needed the money. He understood, but he wasn’t happy because now he couldn’t do anything to help the pain I was feeling. The only thing he could do was to send me to Chicago to Northwestern University Medical Center, to Dr. Robert Addison. At the time, Dr. Addison was sponsoring a 3-week in-patient rehabilitation program for people with chronic pain.

If the rehabilitation program was all he could suggest, that was what I had to do. I was very skeptical of the program, but as I went through each treatment that was provided, I realized that each person received treatment designed specially for him or her. The treatment that identified why I was having so much pain  was a spinal injection of cortisone and local anesthetic. About 20 minutes after the first injection, I was up walking around in my hospital room. The anesthesiologist came into the room to see how I was doing and he found me up and about. He was very surprised.

The anesthesiologist asked me to get back into bed. He went out of the room to get his superior. They both came into the room and began to examine me with the dreaded sharp pin. Both doctors were surprised to find that the spinal injection that should have provided an anesthetic which should have numbed my legs completely for two hours, gave patchy skin results at best. The anesthesiologists told me that day that my spinal cord was wrapped in scar tissue from my waist (Lumbar 1) to my bottom (Sacral 1). That was why I was suffering with pain that was worse than before the surgery.

I was so relieved to hear that the pain I was suffering had an anatomical reason for being there. After hearing so many times that my pain was “all in my head,” I was actually happy to have a “real” pain.

The anesthesiologists did two more spinal injections to try to loosen the scar tissue before I was released from the rehabilitation program. Then, it was time for me to do my own rehabilitation.

Part III of this article, the last part for those of you that are getting bored with my story, will go into what I did to successfully rehabilitate a very painful back to the point of tolerable discomfort. This is a pretty good story with a positive ending so stay tuned for tomorrow’s story.

By Diane | Posted in Chronic Back Pain With A Twist | Tagged | Comments (0)