The News Was Good

On Monday I spent four hours having  several sets of MRIs done on my spinal cord. Yesterday I spent 3 hours in my Neurosurgeons office, but the results turned out to be worth the wait.

For the last few weeks I have been rather apprehensive, probably some post traumatic stress, though I wouldn’t call it a syndrome or a disorder, just some dread because my brain remembers what my body had to endure and it kept screaming at me; IGNORANCE IS BLISS MAN!

While the thought of enduring that kind of surgery ever again was my worst nightmare (and likely still is) I knew that I had to know, so once again I trudged forward in a kind of automatic mode and did what I had to do.

I tried to get the MRI tech to give me some kind of an idea what to expect and his reply was simple:

“You know I can’t do that man”

No smile, no wink, no buts.  Remind me never to play poker with this guy.

So finally I end up at Peachtree Neurosurgery and My Doctors Max Steuer and Carter Cooper are reviewing my “pictures” with me. Max tells me that what we are looking for are areas of white like the ones he points out on my pre surgery scans. as we go through the “slices” I see none of these white areas and Dr Cooper says as you can see there are none.

Relief

Matter of fact the 1% they couldn’t remove isn’t even showing up, they tell me that is a good sign.

They then  switch to a composite photo that shows the big picture and I see a big white almond sized area next to my spinal cord.

My heart sinks.

This, says Dr Cooper is a fluid sac, most likely filled with spinal fluid, it is deep inside your back but I have no doubt it is causing you some pain, eventually it will go away but untill then I’m going to give you some more pain medication in the event you need it.

I didn’t tell him that I still have all of the last two and most of the first scrip for Loritabs that he gave me.  I did tell him that pain was rare and usually not that bad.

They went on to test my strength in my legs, the left one is fine, the right one is particularly weak, specially the part where he puts a finger at the base of my big toe and tells me to flex my foot upwards…I can’t even without his finger there.

He tells me that weakness is because the nerves that control that muscle are damaged, and that muscle doesn’t get any exercise because the nerves don’t fire. He tells me he is going to put me in a brace so that I don’t damage my ankle in the future. He says don’t worry, it fits in your shoe and is easily covered.

Vanity ain’t my long suit anyway I tell him.

Then he tells me he will see me again in a year, I expect next year the stress level will be a lot less.

I’m happy