It’s been a long time since I’ve written anything about my back problems, probably because it’s been so long since it has bothered me.  I would characterize the spinal fusion surgery I had 2 years ago as a huge success (with some limitations).

History
I had a 360 Spinal Fusion, aka Posterior lumbar interbody fusion (PLIF/TLIF), done 2 years ago tomorrow (5/14/2007).  I’ve written about my history before, here and here and I did a quick update after my surgery to describe my situation, but I fell off the blogging cliff for a while and never quite got back to this subject.  My recovery was long and difficult.  It often made me question whether I made the correct decision. 

The Hospital Stay
I spent about 5 days in the hospital including the day of my surgery.  My surgery lasted around 10 hours and I don’t remember much of that day at all.  I was hooked up to an I.V. that delivered pain medication whenever I pushed a button for 2 days.  After that, I went on oral pain meds and they had me get up out of bed and move around the first time in my brace.  It was tough, but it did feel empowering to get out of bed.  My biggest problem was the oral pain meds upset my stomach badly to the point where vomiting was not a fun thing when you’ve been sliced open from the front and the back.  I resolved it by forcing myself to eat even though food had no taste for me for about 2 weeks.  Not sure why that was, perhaps the medication.

Going Home
When I finally got to go home, it was an awesome feeling to be rid of the hospital, the crabby nurses (only a few were) and the medicinal smell that permeated the place.  I had to wear my brace whenever I got out of bed, which made me reconsider if it was worth the effort every time since putting that thing on was a trick.  I stayed home for about 45 days before slowing returning to work.  Looking back, I probably could have used another 2 weeks, but I eased back slowly by working from home 4 hours a day for the first week, 4 hours at the office the next, and then gradually ramping up the hours each week after that.  During that period at home, I had a lot of plans for learning new web technologies, building a few websites and executing on a few ideas.  I accomplished almost nothing I’m sorry to say, but I feel that the recovery took all of that energy out of me.  It was probably for the best looking back not to focus hard on anything but recovering.  That period also made me strongly reconsider whether I had made the right decision whenever I got cabin fever, got sick of all the medication or the brace. 

The TLSO Brace and Followups
I had to keep the TLSO brace on for 3 straight months post surgery.  Being the middle of summer, it was an especially difficult time to have to wear it since I got so hot in it.  I was able to wear it under clothing, but was never confident that it was well concealed.  After my 3 month post surgery checkup, I was allowed to start weaning off it by wearing it a little less each day.  The post surgery checkups involved X-Rays of my spine and the Dr. pointing out how well my fusion was going along.  Each month was a good report, indicating that the bone was growing the vertebrae together as expected.  For some people, there is a risk that this won’t happen, mainly smokers or people with compromised immune systems.  My checkups continued for 1 year after my surgery.  I could have continued for longer since it can take 18 months before it finishes, but I opted out then since the Dr. felt it was no longer necessary.

Today
I’m not real sure why I’m posting this, other than to just document how the process went for anyone else that may be considering going through this surgery.  I spent a lot of time on the Spine Health Back Surgery Forum reading about what others were going through.  It was comforting to know others were in my situation but there was a constant feeling that everyone on the forum was in a dire situation and there was not a lot of hope.  I personally feel that forums like this attract the people with the worst luck and the most difficult situations and make it feel immanently worse than normal.  Don’t be discouraged if you find yourself needing a back surgery like this and reading those kind of viewpoints on the Internet.  I won’t lie to you and tell you it’s easy because it isn’t.  It’s a real tough choice considering the recovery can be lengthy and difficult.  But I really feel that I came through much better off than I have been in the 7-8 years prior.  My 2 previous surgeries relieved the egregious symptoms like leg pain and numbness, but the constant back pain never went away.  Even standing for a few hours made life difficult back then, today no problem.  I feel my spine is stronger and better able to support what I need to do in my daily life.  I do have some limitations:  no lifting more than 50 lbs more than 10 times in a day and no repetitive work like shoveling or sweeping for long periods of time.  I have lost a little bit of flexibility too, but not as much as you may think.  Since I had the L5/S1 site fused, I only lost about maybe 5 degrees in how far I can bend.  In closing, don’t be discouraged, look into all of your options and don’t be afraid to take the steps to make your life better.