Part I - My personal injury and road to recovery
I am sure you are wondering what exactly happened to me and why it was/ or is debilitating? Debilitating is a strong word to use. I don’t really think anyone truly knows the state of pain I was in just a short year ago and the aftermath that followed through Western medicine. I suppose it is time to fully share this story and the agony I was in – however painful the memories might be.
From my journal September 2015: I thought it was a dream, all this pain. The pain in my back, neck and mostly my heart. As I slowly woke up I wondered whose body this was? Groggily I realized it wasn't a dream and the anger swelled up in my chest - the anger that had become my dearest friend.
What is this extra loose skin all over me? As I rolled over slowly and gently got out of bed, I walked into the bathroom. As I turned and looked in the mirror I wondered whose face that is? Certainly not mine. What happened to my hair, skin & eyes? Surely I am still asleep dreaming of old age. I swiped my phone to check the date, nope it's 2015, I am 40. I turned and stepped on the scale and although my weight gain was minimal, it was clear that the loss of muscle mass & lack of sleep was significant.
My second new dearest friend swept through me from my head to my toes - a sadness that consumed my body and made me want to crawl back into bed. It all came flooding back. My back injury, my chronic pain, my lack of working out, my lack of sleep, my depression - then my eyes started to water...I pushed the tears away as crawling back into bed wasn't an option for me. I started my daily routine - coffee, making Hailey breakfast and so another day goes by with what felt like no hope in sight.
That was my life on a daily basis, I never shared the depth of my pain until now. Here is the low down: I have bulging / herniated discs btw. my L5/S1 and L4/L5 roughly 3mm. This does not sound terrible but unfortunately for me, they both are hitting nerves on my left side body. It is not necessarily the size of the bulge – it is whether it is hitting a nerve.
This is not my MRI but one very similar to me and my age at the time mine was taken.
Finally, after trying lymphatic massage, acupuncture and a chiropractor I went to a sports MD. At first they have you go through physical therapy. Physical therapy was wonderful and cured my lower cross syndrome but the nagging chronic pain was still there and rearing its ugly head. Not once in my 4 weeks of physical therapy was I ever relieved 100% of pain. I was at a minimum at a level 5 up to a 9 or 10 depending on what I did that day. Working out was a thing of the past, a distant memory of a happy active life. I spent my evenings going straight to bed with an icepack right after dinner as sitting on a sofa was painful. I spent more time in our bed, going back and forth between crying or being incredibly angry, in that 6 months then I did in a life time. I could hear the laughter btw. my husband and daughter and tears would fill my eyes as I was not a part of the memories being made.
When I wrapped up my last physical therapy session they asked how I felt. As my eyes welled up with tears I said that there has not been one single day that I was not in pain. My therapist was shocked. I guess I hid my pain well. I was finally sent for an intensive 2 hour long MRI. The results were clear, bulging discs directly hitting the nerves. I was excited to have an actual diagnosis to my pain and eager for a solution for recovery. I jumped at the fasted most aggressive route to ease the pain. I was sent to a pain specialist and began the epidurals of cortisone directly into my spine. I went through a series of three rounds. The first two, I had 3 injections and the last I had 4 injections spanning over 2 months. This is not healthy and not good for anyone’s body. Unfortunately, I did not know that. I had not done my research. I was simply looking to ease the pain.
After the first round I felt amazing, I would say my pain level dropped by 70%. I was so excited I immediately jumped for the next round a short 2 weeks later. I should have stopped at round one. After the second round, I didn’t really feel any less pain but was still optimistic. It was about mid-August, one week after the second round that strange things started to happen. It was date night and I had been feeling off all day. As Brian & I were getting ready to go out our nanny asked if I had dental surgery. I thought that was strange as she knows everything about me and it would definitely be something I would tell her. I said no and politely asked why? Apparently the right side of my face was completely swollen. I went and looked in the mirror and was shocked to see my own face. Brian immediately had me take aspirin and asked if I felt any numbness in my arm. I didn’t – we ruled out on oncoming stroke. We all kind of laughed and went ahead to dinner. As I woke up the next morning with no sign of my face returning to normal, more concerns came from my friends and husband. Perhaps it was Bell’s Palsy? I went to urgent care for them to run blood work and they guestimated it was a salivary gland infection. I think they had no idea. I went on a strong round of penicillin for 10 days. After ten days I went back with my face still swollen and my back still in pain. I was then sent to a nose throat doctor and had a CT scan. Again with no conclusive results.
I went in for my third and final round of epidurals. By this time my migraines had increased from once to twice a year to fighting them days on end. I was confined to bed even during the day. My period was lasting up to 11 days and resuming a short week later. I had grown full facial hair and had to bleach my entire face! What the fuck was going on? I finally went to my OBGYN and gave full disclosure to all the drugs and procedures I had been going through in the past few months. I have to say I love her to death, she looked at me and said I will run the blood work to confirm my gut instinct, but she believed it was all side effects from the testosterone in the cortisone. It was wreaking havoc on my body. The results were in and she was correct. I asked what I could do and she said, stay strong, don’t shave your face (I was ready to go have laser hair removal!) it will all subside in about 6 to 8 weeks from your last round of cortisone. No one had ever told me there would be any side effects AND I was still in pain. I had also now spent over $7000 out of pocket and had taken drugs that served no purpose.
For a time-frame, so you can fully understand the length of my depression and pain, the pain began in January of 2015, the effects of the cortisone wore off btw. Thanksgiving and Christmas. I was at a loss as what to do. I went back to see my pain specialist and he recommended back surgery. I was not ready for that yet and wanted to simply put that decision off until 2016. The holidays were upon us and I just wanted to start to live again. To say the least the holidays of 2015 were the most trying times of my life and marriage. I began to turn to yoga to ease my heart as it did almost ten years ago.
I am so happy I did…
Stay tuned for part 2 of my road to recovery.
Namaste