Life is Challenging Right Now

Damn, Damn, Damn. Sorry about the cussing but sometimes it is the only way to truly display your emotional state.

The back has been slowly getting better. Very slow, but improvement keeps hope alive that a pain-free life is a possibility. I have to different types of pain:

1) Nerve pain that starts at the lower back and goes down the back of the left leg all the way down to the foot. It is not a shoot pain, just an intense pain coming from a small area (about the size of a string) going all the way down the leg. I also get bad calf cramps and weakness in the leg when this nerve gets aggravated.

2) Intense lower back pain from the L3 - L5. It is the typical muscle pain you get with a sore back, but there is also an intense pain that feels like a bruise right on the back bone. This makes it very painful to walk up and down stairs (remember, I live in a four story house).

For the past several months, my back pain has really been under control. My main issue is that every time I step up my exercises I left leg starts acting up. However, this was soon to change.

Friday night, while playing poker, the pain in my back slowly starting escalating to the point that I put all my money in on a 12% chance of winning just so I could loose and go home. However, Saturday was fine. I actually did some new PT exercises and did some honey-do’s around the house. I felt good most of the day but Sunday night the back escalated higher than normal.

Monday was the same way; my back was sorer than normal but not so bad too keep me away from work. Unfortunately, throughout the day it slowly hurt more and more. By 4 PM I was in level 9 pain (at level 10 I can’t even move my body because it hurts so badly). Friday night I was pushing the limits on the number of pain pills and muscle relaxing I was taking.

Here is it Tuesday and I am spending the entire day in bed with my pay just one step away from incapacitating me. Hopefully, the pain will drop down to a manageable level by tomorrow. You never know, sometimes it heals quickly, sometimes you stay sore for a week.

It is definitely time to start shopping for a new surgeon (my old surgeon no longer accepts my insurance). Lucky for me I have a VERY good physical therapist. Over the years, he has diagnosed me better than some of the doctors I was seeing. I have printed out all the Orthopedic Surgeon within a 30 mile radius that accepts my insurance and physical therapist is going to let me know which ones he feels are the best.

I think it is time to get the L3/L4 and L4/L5 fused also.