totallynumb

I am down and would love and appreciate hearing your story if you suffer(ed) from numbness and tightness in foot and lower leg after a laminectomy.

I had a "mini laminectomy" on June 27, 2012 due to pain in left leg coming from a l5/s1 herniation. I have degenerative disk disease and I'm 38. As soon as I woke up from my 45 minute surgery (involving a lami and removing disk fragments that were on my nerve), I placed my foot on the floor as was shocked to feel numbness and pain under my foot. Over the days/weeks the numbness and tightness became worse and spread to my toes, heal, padding under foot, ankle, up my calf and upper thigh. It is mostly concentrated on my foot.

The neurosurgent said what she saw during the surgery was a nerve that was was purple, flat, and angry when he did the surgery. He said there was a bone spur which he did not remove because my nerve was so "upset" (saying this was probably due to disk framents that shot on to the nerve from the herniated disk) but he felt sure that the bone spur was not causing problems and not pinching my nerve.

It is now almost 6 months post surgery. I am still numb and have tightness. Actually, I thought the numbness and tightness was a little better (at least the tightness). But now, the numbness is worse and the tightness is very pronounced.

I had another MRI recently, which show lots of inflammation but though it can't say for sure that something isn't pinching it, it does not seem to be.

I get mixed messages from doctors. Some say if I'm not better in a year, it may be nerve damage that will never go away. Another said it can take 2 or 3 years but 3 years is really the tops, and after that the numbness/tightness will not go away.

I would LOVE to hear from someone who is in my situation that has been 6+ months post surgery, and what you are going through now when it comes to numbness/tightness. I am hopeful I will not be left this way