Physical Therapy

On my first meeting with the PT at the osteopath's office, I warned him that the Geneva Convention prohibits torture, expecting that this was gonna hurt...he reminded me that "some people" torture anyway. Hmmm, I wonder to whom he was referring? Anyhow, there was no pain involved in the physical therapy, just a lot of weird positions and stretches. Then he taught me the exercises I need to do to get the joints on my lumbar and sacral vertebrae working properly again. Apparently, when I stopped growing, I adapted well to the difference in the lengths of my legs, but now my body is fighting back, and I'm the one getting beat up. So I am doing my exercises twice a day, and have a lift in my left shoe equal to half of the difference in the length of my legs. I expect I'll get a new lift in a few weeks to match that difference. I don't know whether I'm getting better yet, but I do like to imagine that I am.

But I am almost happy about my problem compared to my granddaughter's...she's 13 years old, a long-legged beauty, and she is having surgery for scoliosis on Feb. 28. From what I have gleaned from my research on the matter, it's nasty, rough surgery. She'll spend a day or two in ICU, and will be out of school for a month. The surgery is happening at Johns Hopkins in Baltimore, and I will be going with my daughter because...well, she wants me to, for one thing. She knows she'll be a wreck and wants me for support, but also, I just feel that I should be there. My family means more to me than anything, having grown up in a cold, dysfunctional family myself.

Second opinion

I went to see an osteopath today, having been referred there by my surgeon...and my three herniated disks may not be the cause of all my back pain. After 20 years of dealing with this s**t, someone finally noticed that one of my legs is longer than the other, and my pelvis is tilted. It's quite possible that I will not need surgery, and that exercise, adjustments and a lift in one of my shoes will fix the problem. I'm stuck between "Yay! I'm gonna get better!" and "Grrrrrr! Why didn't anyone notice this before?"

Either way, I do believe that relief is in sight, one way or the other. Look out, life...I'm coming back!

You know you're in trouble when...

...Oxycontin doesn't help your back pain. It took me a month to get up the courage to try something that has such a stigma attached to it, but enough is enough. I figured, what the hell, give it a try and maybe I'll get some relief for a while. Maybe I can lose some of this depression by being able to help get the store cleaned up and ready for inventory, with such a powerful painkiller.

Well, apparently this pain is mine, all mine. After taking so long to make the decision to try Oxycontin, I was surprised and disappointed to find that it didn't work, not at all. WTF?!!! It didn't help my depression get any better, that's for sure.

Greed, Greed, Greed

How rich is rich enough? Obviously, the sky's the limit, based on my observations. Look at how the price of gas keeps going up; look at how much it cost after Katrina...yet the oil companies' profits are bigger than ever, which tells me that those price hikes were not necessary. That is, unless you're part of Big Oil, and to you, poverty means having to cut back to only two European vacations this year and firing one of your gardeners...

Now, turn to wood pellets. Last year, we installed a wood pellet stove in the house to reduce our heating costs (we have electric baseboard heat). Pellets were $4 a bag. Now, all of a sudden, wood pellets are difficult to come by, and the prices? Try up to $7 per bag! There is no way you can convince me that so many people went out and bought pellet stoves that it created a shortage of pellets. They're made from sawdust, for pete's sake! It's just another opportunity to treat us like sheep. You don't feel sorry for a sheep when it's fleeced, do you? Well, neither do "they".

With fuel prices increasing the way they are, the cost of all consumer goods has to go up in order to cover the increased cost of shipping. And that includes "shipping" yourself to work, if you live in a rural area with no mass transit, as I do. ( Of course, I haven't worked since September, so I'm saving some there. I still have to get to all my doctors, though.)

Prices are up, sales are down, and I won't get a raise this year. Fuck.

Update: Kids, Don't Do Drugs...

It occurs to me that I should update my entry of Nov. 2004...
She never went back to drugs. She's been clean for well over a year; my grandchildren are happy, well-adjusted, and making honor roll. Not only that, she made a "love connection" through NA and is happier than she's been in years. My husband and I both like him very much. And they're getting married!

It's especially wonderful that she has stayed clean through some hard times: my grandson's bipolar disorder, my granddaughter's rheumatic fever (which resulted in a slight mitral valve prolapse) , and the same granddaughter's scoliosis, which will require nasty, major surgery.

Not only that---my daughter and I have regained the closeness we had before she started using. It's so very wonderful to know that there is such a thing as a happy ending.

Pain, Pain, Pain

Wow. My blog is still here. Perhaps I should use it, you think?

I am so very tired of back pain. I've had problems with my back for over 20 years, but for the last 2 or 3 years, it's been a daily thing. On 9/22/05, as I was running errands around town, I noticed that my back was "creakier" than usual, but then, BAM! I was down for the count. By that evening, I couldn't move without severe pain. It lasted about three days before it began to ease off. I couldn't even dress myself. I finally regained mobility, but not much...since then, I am unable to stand or walk for more than 30 minutes. The pain sidelines me; I don't have a choice---I MUST sit down, and now, after I sit down, it takes a while before the pain eases. So, I haven't worked since 9/22/05.

Now, wouldn't it be nice if you could just call a surgeon, tell him you think you need surgery, and get an appointment? Yeah, it sure would. But you can't. You have to jump through hoop after hoop to get there. I'd love to tell all my doctors to try walking a mile in my shoes...because I sure can't.

So, even though the pain on that first day was emergency-room BAD, I knew better than to take that route. From previous experience, I knew that I was likely to have to sit in the waiting room for hours and hours; then they would take me back, dope me up, take a few xrays, and then send me home and tell me to call my doctor. So I skipped all that and called my doctor and asked her to order a new MRI for me, since the last one was 8 years ago. She complied, and told me also to get in touch with my pain management physician.

Yeah. It took a week to get in for the MRI, and three weeks to get in to the pain management doc's office for what turned out to be a new consultation. It took another couple of weeeks to get back in for an epidural injection in my back, with a followup 3 weeks after that. Well, the shot didn't work this time; three weeks later when I went back, they FINALLY set me up with a surgeeon. That appointment was for December 1. Okay, we're at almost 2 and a half months of not being able to work.

So, I see the surgeon on Dec.1, delighted to be there because I thought I could finally see the light at the end of the tunnel. Except---the tunnel got longer. Before he would operate, he wanted two more rather nasty tests. First, a myelogram, which involves piercing the spinal cord, removing spinal fluid and injecting dye which gave me a hellacious headache. They took a bunch of xrays and then did a CT scan. BTW, this appointment was on 12/16. So, at that point, I have one week left of my 12 week FMLA leave, during which I continued to receive my full salary. Now for the second test...which I haven't had yet! The discogram (which is not a dancing telegram, BTW) is scheduled for 1/13. So now, I'm on long-term disability leave at 60% of my salary, one hell of a pay cut, but at least it's something, and I'm congratulating myself for having elected to have payroll deductions for LTD.

So, the discogram promises to be a fun event (that dripping sound you hear is sarcasm). That's when they will insert needles directly into 3 disks in my back to see which ones hurt (or make me scream the loudest?). Then dye will be injected into them and more xrays and another CT scan will be done. Then I see the surgeon again on 1/17.

Folks, that is FOUR MONTHS of being unable to work, when I knew right from the start that it was time for surgery. I'm also supposed to see an osteopath, which is just a chiropractor with a fancier title. In the meantime, the stress is trying to kill me. I got so many phone calls from work between Thanksgiving and Xmas with complaints and problems that I could NOT help with that my BP shot up to 180/110. I finally told them to STOP CALLING ME...but of course, they didn't. The store went straight to hell, and once I get back, it will probably take a couple of years to regain the business that was lost. I've been to the store; it is an unholy MESS, and inventory is next week. My regional is sending people down from other stores to do a cleanup, but I don't think it's going to be enough...and I can't help. So now I'm on blood pressure medication.

Let me tell ya...if the surgeon says "let's try one more thing", I'm going to tell him NO. Just operate and be done with it; I have a life that I'd like to get back to. I want to go back to work, I want to be able to take brisk walks to improve my cardiovascular system and lose weight, I want to be able to pick up a few things at the grocery store without being in pain before I'm done. I want NOT to have to take blood pressure meds, NOT to take pain meds. Yesterday I finally asked my doc for Oxycontin, which I am not happy about, but I really neeeeed some relief.

I guess we'll see.