A Belated Three Month Update

I really wanted to write a post when it was my three month post-op anniversary, which was over a couple of weeks ago now. That obviously didn’t happen, but I still feel I should do a short update of sorts, so that’s why this post is going up!

I really feel pretty much back to normal again. Not completely, as I still get the occasional twinge or ache, and I also still get tired a lot more quickly than before surgery, but in general I feel great. Pretty much everything I need or want to do I am able to do…. apart from putting on any lace-up shoes in a graceful manner. 😛

In terms of pain, I get a lot less now than I was getting before surgery. The only pain I experience now is occasionally a ‘tired’ kind of ache in my shoulders if I’ve had a really long day. In the last few days I’ve been feeling a slight ‘needle’ kind of pain (I don’t really know how to describe it. It’s sort of stabbing, but very mild – like someone’s pricked me slightly with a needle.) in my back. It only happens very occasionally, and I’m pretty sure that it’s the nerves beginning to regrow.

Speaking of nerves, my back is still very numb in a couple of places. It’s weird, and it bugs me a lot, to be quite honest. It’s definitely a lot less numb than it was straight after surgery, but there is still a patch on one side, from my shoulder-blade down to my hip, that is completely numb. By that, I mean that if Mum touches it while she’s changing the tape on my scar, the only reason I know she’s touching it is because I can feel that the skin is being pulled slightly on either side of the numb patch. Like I said, it’s weird. I should get most of the feeling back, but it’s quite likely that I’ll have a couple of numb patches for the rest of my life. It’s a bit hard to say whether that’s the case yet or not, as nerves take a very long time to grow back when they’ve been cut through.

Like I’ve said in the last couple of posts, I really want to put up a photo of my scar. It’s looking really good, and I’m very proud of it. We have taken a few photos of it when the tape is being changed, but I’m not going to post them, as they’re not that great. The tape that we were given is super sticky, and leaves a really tacky residue on my back that is pretty much impossible to get off. It doesn’t look particularly nice in photos, and so I’m going to wait until the tape is off for good (only three weeks to go) and we’ve managed to somehow get all the stickiness off my back. So far we’ve tried soapy water, nail-polish remover, rubbing it (not the actual scar, though) with a facewasher, and even methylated spirits, all to no avail. 😛 Ideas? Abby has suggested steel wool….

There are two questions that I’ve been asked a lot since surgery. First, “Will you ever be able to bend your back?”, and second, “Will you get the rods removed?”. They’re both kind of answered in the same way.

Will I ever be able to bend my back? Short answer: no. But I’ll try and explain why. During surgery I had two titanium rods attached to my spine with screws and hooks. The rods serve two purposes: they were used to crank, straighten and de-rotate my spine as much as possible, and they are holding my spine in place until it is solidly fused together. The rods are not flexible, and so at the moment they are stopping me from bending my back. I can still bend from my hips, but I can’t ‘curl’ my back up or down at all. Even if, when the fusion is solid, the rods are taken out, I still won’t be able to bend. Once all the vertebrae are fused together, that section of my spine will be as solid and stiff as any of the other long bones in my body. So no, I will never be able to bend my back. I know that sounds kind of terrible, but I actually haven’t found it to be that inconvenient at all. All it means is that I have to do some things a little differently than before.

And will the rods ever be removed? I sincerely hope not! Even though they’re not really necessary once the fusion is solid, they’re not going to do any harm just staying there. Like I said, I wouldn’t be any more flexible if they were taken out, so unless they were causing problems for some reason, there’s no point in removing them. Very occasionally a rod can break, but that means that a part of the spine hasn’t fused properly, which puts so much stress on the rod that it will break. Given my age and the type of scoliosis that I have, this is very unlikely to happen. Having the rods removed would require another whole operation, and I mean it when I say that I never want to do this again!

I’ve been meaning to post this video for a long time. It’s an animation of a spinal fusion. As it’s completely animated,  there is no blood or nasty stuff involved, and the most squeamish person should be fine watching it! It basically just shows how the screws and rods are attached to the spine, and then how the spine is straightened. Since it doesn’t show any bone chips being packed onto onto the spine, I suppose it’s not technically an animation of a fusion. But it still gives the general idea of how the operation is performed.

Pretty amazing, I think. Whenever I watch it I’m reminded of why this recovery is kind of long, and how well I feel for only a few months post-op!