It was a big one… 9 hours long. And there were some complications, like a so-called dura-leak, where the skin around the spinal cord is damaged and spinal fluid can leak out. They fixed that, pulled the moved vertebra from 2.2 cm out back to only 1 cm out, put 4 screws with a connecting metal rod on either side of the lower spine to fix that in place, put some bone graft material between two vertebrae and managed to make room for the nerves coming out of the spinal cord. They kept me overnight in the recovery room after that. I was so uncomfortable having to lay flat on my back, and of course not really with it, that I tried to turn on my side… looking back that was a mistake and the nurse there scolded me for it.
The surgery was on Monday, my sister (who had arrived on the Sunday) went home on the Wednesday morning. And the Thursday was the first day I felt more consistently awake. I was also allowed to sit up and been briefly out of bed (standing next to the bed for a few minutes) and both times I got a headache almost immediately… which was not a good sign. On the Friday I got the gel mattress… and that made a huge difference, much more comfortable to lay on, especially given my weight. By Saturday, I was walking in the corridor with a high walker and the physiotherapist… but the wound kept leaking fluid, especially after walking.
By 1 week after surgery, I was walking with a low walker in the corridor, and that went pretty well, if only the wound would stop weeping… it didn’t. On the following Thursday, 10 days after the initial surgery they did a wound revision and fixed the dura leak, cleaned out the rest of the wound and stitched it up again. That, thankfully only took a couple of hours. My sister had come down again for that, and she left the next day. Since it was a dura-leak, it was another 3 days flat, and I was a lot more careful, also now better understanding the reason, and the gel mattress helped a great deal. Still, after 3 days, I had enough of it, how I ever managed to do that for 6 weeks back in 1981, I don’t know. On the Monday I was allowed out of bed again, and resumed the walking. The first day out of bed and walking in the corridor, the wound was pretty wet again, or afterwards when I was back in bed… and we were worried, but after that one time, it became dryer and dryer… unlike the previous time, when it had slowly gotten worse. I was saved by the long Easter weekend, on the Thursday they were still considering having to go back in again. The first mention of it was on the Wednesday, that really bummed me, and my sister jumped back in her car and came over… again. But what they had not realised or forgotten, that my long term cortisone treatment has slowed wound healing. Since it was a long weekend, no scheduled surgeries took place and to my big relief, on the Sunday, the wound stayed completely dry, despite walking up and down the corridor! The fact that I hadn’t had any headaches either, had helped to convince me that it wasn’t another dura-leak (or recurring one). Since the wound healing was so slow, they insisted that they wanted to pull the stitches.
So.. that happened on the Thursday, 2 weeks after the wound revision, and my sister came down, once again, and then the next day took me home! Yay. Finally… I was more than ready to leave by then. I had several visitors despite most of my friends and family living far, far away. My sister was there once a week, that totally surprised me that she came as often as she did! My brother and is family came down as well to visit in the Easter weekend. Michael, who is local, also came to visit and I had two visits from one of my LOTRO friends, he lives local, but we had never met before. I had suggested he come visit at one point more out of jest, and the showed up… and then again, when I was still there at Easter, that was a lovely surprise! Another of the LOTRO band member friends send a care package with lovely stuff in it. The band is from the German server, so we are mainly locals. And if I hadn’t had my travel laptop there to play a little and watch some stuff, I would certainly have gone nuts!
Anyway, almost 4 weeks after the surgery, I went home! Everything was suddenly harder, since I was alone. I did get nursing support once a day for help with washing. And it was needed, I was so stiff really. I am not allowed to bend over, twist my torso or lift over 5 kg (11 lbs) for 12 weeks after surgery, so that the bone graft can heal / fix itself in place. I needed my hiking stick to walk in the house initially. I just felt unstable. Part of that is due to the fact my feet feel ‘funny’. I don’t have proper feeling in them, and that just makes for unstable walking initially. I used to love to walk bare feet, or with just socks on, but not anymore. I am wearing my crogs a lot at the moment. The stability has improved over time, and i don’t need my stick in the house anymore. I did a bit of walking outside, and managed to walk to the other building and back, about 100 m and my knees hurt, but not my back. The bladder control issues, which had been pretty bad, have improved considerably, all but gone. So, overall, I think it was a success and worth it.
I’ve been home a month now, and about ready to go back to work. I hope that my GP will agree on Monday, because all I do here is sit in front of my computer in the day time… and I can do that at work too. Besides, I don’t see or talk to people at the moment. As of tomorrow, my yeoman extra support will be the last (she has been coming 3 x week). Thankfully, my very German boss-lady is understanding so as long as my GP agrees, I am good to go. The other thing is that I am just not very sleepy, especially in the evening… I am not tired… so my sleeping pattern is all over the place. Tomorrow I am going to get myself some sleeping tablets and see if I can reset it a bit…
For now, at nearly 4 am… trying that sleep thing again!