29 Aug 06 Back Injury, Dav VII
I’m still decomissioned. I can walk better, although now my hips (particularly on the right) are starting to hurt a little because I walk with a funny gait. I have now been inspected via X-ray and MRI and have been to see an orthopedic nurse practitioner. The result? I have a torn disk. It’s the one between the last two vertibrae. What was explained to me is that a tear in the disk allowed some of its fluid to seep out into the surrounding muscle tissue, causing a great deal of pain and irritation. The fluid is caustic and thus causes a chemical reaction with the effects I described.
Anyway, want to know what his solution was? Walk it off. He wants me to walk as much as possible.
Me: What should I do when I’m not walking?
He: Walk.
Supposedly that will help re-align all the parts down there and physical therapy will help re-strengthen the muscles in my lower back, and with God’s blessing, I’ll be back to normal in a couple weeks or so.
I’m getting digital copies of my Xrays and MRIs tomorrow, so I’ll try to find one that illustrates my injury and post it here for the morbidly curious out there.
Tags: back_injury
26 Aug 06 Back Injury, Day V
My back is still mostly kaput. I can stand & walk (ok, ok, shuffle) for short amounts of time (i.e., < 30 minutes). I can sit up for a little longer than that, but after about an hour, it's about time to lay flat again.
I'm still doped up. I still can't hardly move (and any motions I make are more or less excruciating). When I imagine a scale of pain, 0 being normal and painless to 10 being Jesus Christ being crucified on the cross, I'd say back pain like what I have is somewhere near a 3 or 4. It hurts that bad.
The worst part? I can't do anything about it. Nada. It just needs time to heal.
In other news, both sets of parents came by today to get some work done today sine I’m completely disabled. My dad helped me get the ground anchors attached and the plywood flooring installed on my shed, while my mom worked in our garden (ok, the part of the ground where our garden is supposed to be). My father-in-law mowed and weed-eated (weed-ate?), while my mother-in-law helped my wife clean.
It was a productive day, and I had virtually nothing to do with it.
Tags: back_injury, detached_study
23 Aug 06 Back Injury, Day II
I went to a physical therapist today. He ran me through a number of motions, excercises, and devices intended to make my lower back feel better, but at least for the first visit, they made the injury more painful. I suppose one might texpect that.
Anyway, this strain/bulging disk/torn ligament is excruciating. On a scale of 1-10 (10 being the most severe pain I’ve evere experienced), I told the PT that this was a 6 or so. My broken arm, and some of my growing pains were pretty intense, but this ranks right up there with them. This pain is certainly more sustained and constant than any other I’ve experienced.
So, note to all who read this: lift things with your legs. Period.
Tags: back_injury
23 Aug 06 A back is a terrible thing to waste
Well, yesterday morning, after spending many, many hours over the weekend lifting building supplies and getting the floor frame of my detached study built, I woke up feeling great. There was no soreness or anything, and I felt well-rested. I went about my normal morning routine. As I was nearing time to leave for work, I bent over to pick up one of the shoes I was going to wear, and I suddenly started feeling a pain in my back. I didn’t immediately think much of it, but within a few minutes, I was almost completely immobilized. I had injured my back. It probably was a result of my working so hard over the weekend and not being careful to use my legs to lift instead of my back.
I’m sure paying the price now. I am in excruciating pain. The only time I’ve felt pain that I would say was worse than this was when I broke my arm into a “Z” shape. It is very painful to get from one place to another. It’s also very painful just to change positions, except for a few limited ones that are relatively painless, such as going from lying flat on my back to lying on my chest.
The physician’s assistant that I saw ordered at least 3 days of no work and prescribed a pain killer and a muscle relaxing drug. I’ve been on those and they seem to help a little. By the end of yesterday, I could even sit up, albeit leaning forward drastically.
This morning, I was in more pain than I was yesterday, partly because I hadn’t had any of my drugs for over 8 hours, but also because some latent soreness had set in. It was very painful just to drag myself (literally) to the toilet. I wasn’t even sure I’d be able to get off it.
Anyway, work on the study is, needless to say, halted for the time being, as is everything else. My wife is doing a really great job of taking care of me.
I’m going to see a physical therapist friend this afternoon, so I’m hoping that will prove an effective method for restoring some of my mobility (fyi, I will eventually recover all my mobility – it’s just that I have virtually zero mobility right now and wil probably be that way for a few days).
Tags: back_injury, detached_study
