“What you don't understand you can make mean anything.”
― Chuck Palahniuk, Diary
The Season's Changing is one of the things I used to look forward to the most. Not only did it mean a different type of Weather, sometimes Longer days, sometimes shorter, but It also meant, that it was Either Summer, which meant I was free to be with the horses all day, or it meant that I was One season Closer to Summer, when I was free to be with the horses again. Summer has ALWAYS been my favorite season! Since I was born in December, I always said I should have been born in Australia, as December is their Summer!!! (I know....Doesn't really count considering I also thought I was on the Titanic and I was eaten by sharks!!!) But, either way, the Fact remains that Summer is BY FAR, my favorite season even as an Adult. Before that day long ago when I broke my hand, Summer was still my favorite time. It meant that I would be outside working on my car, playing basket ball, swimming, playing on a Co-Ed Softball team, Roller-Blading and anything else I could find to do. My Best Friend and at the time Roommate, were outside playing basket ball either by ourselves, or with the neighborhood kids. We were constantly riding our bikes, and finding outdoor things to do. We went' camping almost every weekend in the summer time. I swear, I could have been more than just 'happy' living permanently out in the woods "Camping". It would save up so much Money!!! We were very Very active people. Even after I broke my hand, I continued being active. I just tried to find a way to modify the activity to be the least painful for me as we could possibly do. For example, We changed the hand grips on my bike to be a much softer, gentle material that didn't bother my hand as much. In addition to that, Instead of always riding using my hands and a lot of pressure on my wrists and forearms, I changes how I gripped the handle bars. I used my right hand to assist with steering. That way, if I couldn't use it, I was still able to ride my bike with some slight changes. The wind on my arm used to really be a problem for me, so we came up with a way to cover my arm, using material that I could tolerate touching me, and then found ways to not only keep it on, but if I got cold, we could use those Portable Hand Warmers and insert them into my arm cover (needless to say, my bestie/room-mate is VERY creative!!!). I never wanted to be the one to let this hold me back. Even when I knew it was something that I shouldn't' be doing, or was extremely painful to do, I would find a different reason to avoid the situation. That way, again, I never had to say "I can't do it" as that is something that is extremely hard for me to deal with, so, I just pretend its something else. That is one of the most helpful ways for me to deal with my pain. Instead of saying that I can't do something, I focus on something else, and that I am able to do.
I very much believe that this determination is what has helped me to get through this while maintaining a full time job. I would never say that I am a Pro and understand everything that I am going through. Hence the reason for the Injections that are coming my way, and why else would I be blogging, Creating a website and managing a Facebook page about this right now?
Even though the weather does have a huge effect on my pain, and how badly the day effects me, there is much more that effected the reasons behind my recent change of interests. You see, as I stated above, I used to be very active. However, since I got the RSD, my activities did Decrease. I quite doing things like Snow boarding for fear of what would happen if I crashed, or fell. I was so scared of the RSD moving to my left arm, or my leg if I got hurt. That's how the activities slowly started to decrease. I really only did a few things that didn't really hurt the rest of my body, and didn't include my hand. Well, that all changed the day I decided to get this surgery.
The first thing my partner and I realized after watching the first video about the simulator, is that most of the people in the video were much older than myself. Most of them were older than my parents for that matter. However, we decided after discussing it quite a bit with each other, our family members, the doctors, and our friends. We were able to talk to a few people who either had it, or knew somebody that did have it. Finally we decided that Pro's outweighed the Delta's, and we told my doctor we were interested. They quickly sent us home with more videos, and a book that I needed to keep track of where my pain was, so we could compare that to where my pain was with the temporary stimulator in.
They weren't expecting to be able to get me in so quickly, however it only took about 3 weeks until we were ready to implanted the Temporary stimulator into my Spinal Cord. I wasn't able to take a shower the entire time I had this in, because as my Doctor put it "It's a direct portal to the Spine! NO Shower, No Water." He kinda scared us, but I guess that was kinda his point! I will be taking a Picture of the temporary lead that I had inserted in my spine. I had it in for 4 days. During that period of time, I was not able to Pull my self up out of a chair, our bed, Take a shower, drive, or anything else because the Lead could move. Since this was just a temporary trial period, the lead was not anchored down as they are when permanently implanted.
We had to prove to the insurance company that there was at least a 50% improvement when it came to my pain level. For my RSD, it was a total success, and we even had hopes at the time that it may even cover my neck!! If we could get it to cover my neck, were very may have been able to control all of my chronic pain just by doing the implant.
Please be patient.....I will post pictures and more about the Implant, the surgery itself, and how long it took me to heal afterwards. That will all be coming soon.
Thank you for taking the time to read my story and being apart of my journey!
I very much believe that this determination is what has helped me to get through this while maintaining a full time job. I would never say that I am a Pro and understand everything that I am going through. Hence the reason for the Injections that are coming my way, and why else would I be blogging, Creating a website and managing a Facebook page about this right now?
Even though the weather does have a huge effect on my pain, and how badly the day effects me, there is much more that effected the reasons behind my recent change of interests. You see, as I stated above, I used to be very active. However, since I got the RSD, my activities did Decrease. I quite doing things like Snow boarding for fear of what would happen if I crashed, or fell. I was so scared of the RSD moving to my left arm, or my leg if I got hurt. That's how the activities slowly started to decrease. I really only did a few things that didn't really hurt the rest of my body, and didn't include my hand. Well, that all changed the day I decided to get this surgery.
The first thing my partner and I realized after watching the first video about the simulator, is that most of the people in the video were much older than myself. Most of them were older than my parents for that matter. However, we decided after discussing it quite a bit with each other, our family members, the doctors, and our friends. We were able to talk to a few people who either had it, or knew somebody that did have it. Finally we decided that Pro's outweighed the Delta's, and we told my doctor we were interested. They quickly sent us home with more videos, and a book that I needed to keep track of where my pain was, so we could compare that to where my pain was with the temporary stimulator in.
They weren't expecting to be able to get me in so quickly, however it only took about 3 weeks until we were ready to implanted the Temporary stimulator into my Spinal Cord. I wasn't able to take a shower the entire time I had this in, because as my Doctor put it "It's a direct portal to the Spine! NO Shower, No Water." He kinda scared us, but I guess that was kinda his point! I will be taking a Picture of the temporary lead that I had inserted in my spine. I had it in for 4 days. During that period of time, I was not able to Pull my self up out of a chair, our bed, Take a shower, drive, or anything else because the Lead could move. Since this was just a temporary trial period, the lead was not anchored down as they are when permanently implanted.
We had to prove to the insurance company that there was at least a 50% improvement when it came to my pain level. For my RSD, it was a total success, and we even had hopes at the time that it may even cover my neck!! If we could get it to cover my neck, were very may have been able to control all of my chronic pain just by doing the implant.
Please be patient.....I will post pictures and more about the Implant, the surgery itself, and how long it took me to heal afterwards. That will all be coming soon.
Thank you for taking the time to read my story and being apart of my journey!
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