SALioness

Here is my story and I am 49 years old.

Briefly, I had my disc replacement surgery at 2 levels done, c5/c6 and c6/c7 15 days ago today. (1 November 2012) and so far the results are wonderful and better than expected so far, especially only after my 2 week.

I do still take pain killers for the op, but I got the movement and strength back in my arms immediately, felt my thumb and fingers which were numb, straight when I woke up from the anesthetic.

Only thing, was that my right should was in incredible spasm and I had pain in my left arm, which I did not have before the op. But this is now settling nicely.

I can move my head completely to the left and to the right, tonight I am in front of my computer, I do still wear my collar, but I have started leaving it off for longer periods at a time. I have tried driving my car a short distance (last weekend).

I was fine with that. I now feel so well, even with the pain that I have, that I have to watch myself that I do not overdo things. In fact, that is the reason why I do not want to take pain killers, is because I am scared I will feel TOO good.

Anyway, the worst so far, has been the swallowing. I battle to swallow the pills, every now and again, they get stuck in my throat. But last night, I choked on one, that did not want to come up, eventually my friendly, who was luckily there, turned me over, slapped me on my back a few times, cos I was gasping for breath too.

Eventually, pill came out – but during this time, neither of us even thought about the surgery I had only 2 weeks ago, I just didn’t want to die choking. (needless to say, I now cut the capsules open and mix the powder with liquid and drink them that way.)

Anyway, I was worried that maybe, with the bashing on my back, which was not so gentle, I might have undone or jolted my disc replacements, or that the discs would have moved, but I went to physio today and I am fine. He assured me that if I undid anything, I would have felt it straight away.

But like I say, I feel good tonight. Saw your question on the forum and thought I would share my story so far, especially that it is only day 15 after my op. The only thing the doc said to me are that my bones are very soft and he wants to monitor that.

I go for a 6 week checkup and followup xray and a bone density on the 11 Dec 2012. Will let you know how that goes.

Also going to be monitoring my Lumber vertebra because I also have a spinal stenosis in my L3/4 and L4/S region – don’t want a fusion there either, so we are going to monitor that over the next few years, so that do not go past the stage where a fusion is needed. I want to have my discs replaced there too.