Back Again

The back pain has risen its ugly head again. It drove me to bed early, and with a little help from my friends I slept twelve hours. This morning I'm creaky but managed a shower.  I'm using my cane just in case of a lockup spasm. I took a muscle relaxer, the first in three weeks. I heard someone we know with back pain got an Ozone treatment. I wonder if I will have to go that far afield in search of relief.

The flare-up is a result of that damn leg stretcher or whatever-they-call-it machine at PT.

So the number of active problems is back to two again.

Anyway, I built the Timeline (three pages in a Word chart format) and have it at my disposal now. It covers higher level events than a mere flare-up. That's what this blog helps me grouse and vent about.

Meanwhile at Rehab...and History Chart Notions

Yesterday's brief adventure on the medievil leg stretcher machine left me sore. Here on the next day I'm hobbling more than usual.  I said with bravado I'd try it again, but next time I'll tell the therapist no. The position on that machine aggravated my back.

Overall, the sessions have strengthened my body and spirit, and I have an improved center of balance. I can do without a cane 90% now. My weakest moments are extended periods standing. Even walking is better than standing still. The duration of either activity is not where it should be, by a long shot.
I don't know what a 72-year could should be capable of. Sometimes I think my therapist forgets that I'm un viejo, and I have to remind her.

There have been days I would rather not go, and I suppose that's a normal feeing. But once there, I immediately get the energy and hopeful vibes from the therapist and others at work, and the hour goes quickly. I am scheduled through March and then will have an evaluation as to what's next.

Last night in my 3 am sleeplessness period, I envisioned. timeline for all of this so I won't have to explain so much to the next doctor I see.  The chart would cover major events from September to the Present, a History at a Glance sort of thing. When I have the time and uninterrupted quiet.

There will be another doctor, I tell myself.  I plan to switch Pain Mgmt docs and go to either CCFL or Memorial and ask for help on this Piriformis or whatever it is pain.  I'll ask for an injection. And images, x-ray or CT, of the pelvic area. Something I've asked for in the past and never had.

Mystery Origins

My Doc's PA said the excruciating pain remaining in my left hip/butt and leg may be due to the sacroiliac joint or SI joint, which is the junction of the sacrum and ilium. An SI problem can mock the same symptoms as a protruding disk.  The only way to know for sure is to have a diagnostic injection into the joint.

This hip & leg stuff has been an excruciating ailment for months, caused by sciatica they say. The source of the pain is the herniated disc, they said, whose ruptured content impinges on nerves in the spinal canal.

Now I 'm not sure they were right or wrong or half and half. It's like a game of Clue.

My current theory on my second and now worst ailment? As the ER doc said, and as my PT therapist believes, the hip/butt area pain is more likely muscular. A deep strain of the piraformis, painful in itself and raising hell by pinching the sciatic nerve as well.

Tall Stick mean Change, Kemo Sabe

I recall an NC writer friend recovering from knee surgeries who returned gradually to his hiking spot, Crowders Mountain, and used a tall staff or hiking stick as a walking aide, rather than a cane. I think initially he may have had two sticks, like a skiing-type person.

At the PT place, I saw a viejo surfer dude using something vertical and similar as he left the lobby. His support was like a flat totem pole or tall Hawaiian tiki stick.

I have put the cane down mostly (sometimes out of stubbornness rather than good sense), and am considering a tall stick to replace the cane, upon which I invariably lean forward with a grimace, appearing bent and pitiful. It's in no way a posture-assisting device, but I think a tall stick or staff might be.

I'm doing better after several PT visits, with more to come, extending into March. As I attested in the title poem inside my tiny book "February Toast," this is not a month for me to fuck with. And this time it has 29 days.

The PT is the only positive constant so far.

Yesterday I had what was likely the last visit to Escobar, the mad scientist Pain Mgmt doctor. I chose to wait on any further (more radical) treatment options and take at least a month for healing time without someone prodding and injecting me. The insurance doesn't want anymore anyway.

What develops next is a direct result of how well I continue to convalesce.

I am a long way from my friend's mountain treks. Maybe he could abstract pain better than I can. Meanwhile, I remain unready for prime time, but nevertheless am making incremental gains in my limited urban world these days, making trips to the barbershop or to the gas station (finally I am driving).

Physical Rehab Works (so far)

I went into Thursday's PT session #2 more optimistic than before, ready to welcome the drills and stretches and massage that would help strengthen and lead me out of Pain City.

I wasn't disappointed.  Sore, but stronger and ready for the next session on Monday. Most importantly, I have been walking more without the cane.

The therapist worked me hard, stepping me up from the gentler sort of exercises I had been doing the past ten days. I left limber and aware of muscles in my legs and midsection that I had forgotten after three months of doing basically nothing.

This coming week, there are two more PT's then a Friday followup with the Pain Management doc. I am imagining, hoping, half-expecting this to be my last visit there for a long while.  At least six months before anymore steroid shots are allowable.  What else does the mad scientist have in mind? We'll see.

And what do the therapists at CCFL PT have in store for me? We'l see about that too.

During a bad week in America

It's getting a bit old, the doubt. It's scary what causes it.

It's not like everything in the world is exactly cheery. The news, the plague, the politics, the tyranny... it's depressing.

Once again I've had two or three days where I felt things were turning around. Then late yesterday and all day today, the pain nagged me. The free-walking was not so nice. My language grew worse.

Tomorrow is PT. I am a believer that it will help. But I am also prepared to bring out the big pain pills if things don't turn around.  Time will tell what the hell I can do next.

Triple and a Full Moon

It's one of baseball's most exciting plays. The triple. Sometimes it can bring a triumphant end to the game.

I was nervous before my triple, ESI procedure #3.  I tried not to be predictive, that is, not pointing to either end of the turnout gauge and worrying over good or bad.  I took a Trammadol in advance to stay as neutral and relaxed as I could.

A new assistant stood near, as I lay on my stomach and raised my head from the torturous open square slot to take a peek.  Cute.  She will give me assurances toward the end of the shots. She knows I hate being positioned belly-down on this damn platform.  They pull my shorts down all they way this time.  The shots today must be farther the spine down toward L5 and S1.  In return she and the other, regular assistant, get at a full moore moon until the Doc comes in and drops a towel down and places his toolkit items there, or so it feels.

24 hours later I feel some relief. I suspect this is largely the lidocaine dilutive at work, or it could be power of suggestion.  I've learned that the injections can tease you.

Once again I won't really know until time passes. The chems seem to race through my system faster than most. By end of next week, I may have my own evaluation. Doc says the third time is a charm, but then again he said that about the 2nd ones, too.

PT will continue next week, and I look forward to the strengthening it provides.