i feel so bad for my dadinlaw. his back has been awful and he is so proud about pain. and he is pretty much going to have to have disk repl@cement surgery but that's only 1 of the things wrong out of many. basically he's 71 and his lower spine is beginning slow distintegration and there is not a whole hell of a lot of hope for that sort of thing so he's doomed to a cycle of pain, increasing disability, and probably more surgeries. and meanwhile he can only walk like 1 block, in agony, how is he functioning? and is going to asia for several weeks right before the surgery. he's so nuts. but i feel for him and suddenly feel regret that i didnt acquiesce and be dutiful for us to all go to asia with him and go to the gravesite or whatever. and i could hear he is intensely sad over his big plan to go to mt. p@ektus@n and he is trying to believe that he will do it next year. yah right. i cross myfingers that it will be true. maybe miracle surgery? hrm from everything i have read about disk repl. and fusing -- it's scary.
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Spinal fusion is scary. My mom has had to have two now and she's only 46. I wrote about it a little bit on my blog. She does have some relief from the pain, but other things are wrong with her now after the surgery. Some numbness in one of her legs, it just gives out on her at random times, some atrophy in the same leg as well. She still has to take the big M pain reliever every day and she is now developing arthritis in her SI joints because of all the damage from the accident that was the cause for the surgeries and the fusions themselves. However, she will still tell you that she is better off right now because she couldn't really walk at all before and was in much worse pain. She can bend and squat now. She can stay on her feet for about two hours. She'll never work again, but she can do little things around the house like container gardening.
Posted by: Melanie | July 26, 2004 at 07:11 AM
I stumbled upon your blog while I was doing some online research. While there are risks to this type of surgery, for someone who is in unrelenting pain, it can be a godsend. I've known people who felt so much better after their procedure. Good luck to you all!
Posted by: panasianbiz | July 18, 2006 at 05:14 PM
He had some kind of surgery but I've already forgotten what it was. And this fall he's going on a walking tour of Europe ... so it got QUITE a lot better!
Posted by: badgerbag | July 18, 2006 at 07:50 PM