Tag Archives: Blessings

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6 Months Post Spinal Fusion

It hardly seems possible that it’s really been 6 months since my surgery, but I can’t deny the truth of the calendar. I’ve gone from the heat of summer, to a beautiful fall of color, to the depths of a snow packed winter. I’ve gone from walking with a walker, to a cane, to slow but deliberate walking, to the ability to walk as much as I want. I’ve gone from no lifting, bending, twisting, through a slow and steady recovery, to being able to lift what I need, bend forward and touch my toes, and gentle twists in my upper body. I’ve learned how to protect my back muscles and keep my spine stable. I’ve learned to kneel and squat down instead of bending at the waist to reach things on the floor. I’ve strengthened my hips and legs, and I’ve worked to strengthen my core muscles, the big and little ones, and I’ve worked to strengthen and stretch my back muscles and the muscles in my legs and hips. It’s been a huge recovery process, but I feel good with my process and what I can do now.

This past week I had a visit with my surgeon. New x-rays show my fusion is growing stronger, and all the rods and screws and cages are doing their job. He is pleased with my progress, and the strength and flexibility I’ve gained. He commented that it looked like I’d dropped a few pounds (yes, validation!), and that it looked like I was more comfortable. I agreed with him, and asked him about continuing restrictions. For the past 6 months I’ve been to avoid using a heating pad, and no use of NSAIDS. I’m cleared to use them now if i feel the need. I’m cleared to lift safely and smartly. We talked about craft shows, and that I am to be careful and not lifting while bending or twisting, and to keep my boxes packed on the light side. I’m allowed to walk, jog if I want (not likely), ride a bike, swim (also not likely), and do as much yoga as I like so long as I’m careful during twisting poses and don’t ask too much of my body. I’m to be careful and extra cautious in the snow and ice – NO FALLING. The fusion itself will continue to heal for the next year, but I’m right on track. His parting words to me were, “Call me if something comes up, but you MUST DO YOUR EXERCISES EVERYDAY FOR THE REST OF YOUR LIFE.” Alrighty then, message delivered doc!

The next day was my appointment with Brenda, my physical therapist. She put me through the paces and did some massage on my whole back (I was a little extra stiff apparently). She talked about challenging my strength and using some resistance along with more repetitions. She sent me home with some bands to use. She agrees with the doc’s assessment to keep doing what I’m doing, and keep adding strength challenges. She talked a lot about being aware of my body mechanics, and listening as my muscles gain strength. When you get stiff or sore, take the time to rest and stretch things out before doing more. When you feel like you need to sit and rest, do so. When you feel like you need to get up and move, do so. When your muscles get tight, use your massage stick and tennis ball to release the tension. And you MUST DO YOUR EXERCISES EVERYDAY FOR THE REST OF YOUR LIFE.

So apparently, I keep moving along and doing my exercises for the rest of my life. I knew going into this surgery that as important as what happened that day in the operating room was, that my recovery and rehab would be even more important, and a life long commitment.

My food tracking app tells me that I’ve been tracking food and eating cleanly for 47 days now. I’ve also been riding my exercise bike regularly, and working hard on my PT exercises and doing yoga a few times a week. I feel like I’m in a healthy mindset, and the doc was right, I have lost weight since the first of the year. I’m not dieting per say, but I’m also not eating crap. I’m monitoring my calories each day, and avoiding eating grains and starches, and avoiding sweets and overly processed food. I don’t feel deprived, and I’ve been enjoying looking for and trying new recipes. We have been eating a lot more fresh produce, and I know I’m feeling much better in general – I have more energy and am sleeping better too.

If you aren’t in the Pacific North West, let me share that we have been given our entire dose of winter…in a couple week’s time. It just keeps snowing…many inches in the cities, a lot of wind, and out in the hinterlands where I live – we are measuring the snow in FEET. There have been school closures, road closures, and when you do get out and about, the roads have been a mixed bag of snow covered, slush covered, clear, and drifts. Don’t get me wrong, it’s beautiful…but I’m tired of it. The closed the university for a day last week, and we had late start another day…and those things hardly ever happen. It’s been several years since the last time it happened.

Last weekend the snow created all kinds of havoc. Wind gusted snow across the roads creating white out conditions, and drifts accumulating in the roads. It just wasn’t safe to travel out of the cities. After a series of messages between our pastor, the elders in the church, and myself, and a bit of prayer – I was asked to not only lead our service because our pastor couldn’t make it down, but also to deliver the sermon. I’ve had to do this before due to weather, but she wrote the sermon, and I just read it. This time, she and I spoke at length, and her sermon wasn’t a good fit for me to deliver. God has been pushing me recently to step out of my comfort zone more and more. So I spoke to my pastor about a sermon idea I had. She approved of the direction I was being led, and I sat down Saturday evening using a sermon outline another pastor had written, I wrote a sermon on the Power of Prayer. I used my lovely new bible to find appropriate scripture references, and listened to my heart as I was writing. I sent it to my pastor to look at, and for any last minute changes, and I went to bed.

Sunday morning I got up and ready for church, printed the bulletin that Pastor E had sent me, read her words of encouragement, and printed my sermon notes. My little country church congregation was lovely and supportive as I not only lead our service, but delivered my first official sermon. I went ahead and recorded it with my phone, to send to pastor, and a few close friends. After prayerfully considering my options, and the motivations behind them, I’ve decided to share it with you as well. May my words truly bless you.

Power of Prayer

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Thankful for Healing

On this Thanksgiving Day, I’m thankful for the healing in my body this year.  The year isn’t over, nor is the healing, but it’s still something to be thankful for!

I’m at a touch over 3 months post spinal fusion.  My spine is held together by 6 screws and 3 rods, plus cages in the disk space between vertebrae L4-L5, and L5-S1.  Oh, and bone matter.  The goal is that everything will be held together by solid bone, and the titanium of course.  I will see my surgeon again next week, and expect a good report from him.

I’ve been in physical therapy for 6 weeks now.  Danielle is finally back, and she has been working me hard!  We have a couple areas of focus:  my hips and pelvis, and my upper back.  She wants increased movement and flexibility in my upper spine so I’m doing a lot of stretching and rotation work in my shoulders and upper rib cage, rotating from the bottom of my rib cage to look over my shoulders, and reach across my chest.   My hips and glutes are working as well to give me stability in my pelvis to support my sacrum and low back.  During my PT sessions, Danielle has me working on the Pilates reformer – doing a lot of squats in various positions to work specific muscles both in my hips and glutes, but also in my lower abs.  We are working on the flexibility of my low back (those muscles got VERY tight after surgery) while keeping my spine itself in a neutral position, but also stretching my hamstrings and hips.  Everything has been very tight because of years of chronic pain and moving in “defensive and protective” mode.  So I’m doing lots of stretches each day, as well as muscle building activities.  Danielle has also been working on helping the nerves to heal by loosening their paths as well as stretching them.  I have a series of “neural flossing” stretches and movements that are working like a charm.  Nerves heal so slowly, but I am noticing changes in my symptoms, so I know what I’m doing is helping!  Also, Danielle has been great about helping me modify and get comfortable in different yoga poses to help me get back into regular routines.  Best of all, she’s given me confidence to start really pushing my healing forward.

I’ve kind of turned the corner from being in a very protective healing mode and being extremely careful, almost fearful, about doing something to put my surgery in jeopardy – to pushing hard and moving much more.  My stamina is increasing, both muscular and cardio.  I can walk comfortably for a lot longer – it’s not just one slow gentle walk to the driveway, but 3 trips back and forth at a quick pace.  I’m noticing more muscle strength in the muscle groups we’ve been working on, but still need to focus on really engaging the RIGHT muscles to do the exercises, not what my body has been compensating with for years.  I laughed when Danielle said I have some really bossy muscles that need to take a back seat to the ones who are supposed to be working.  I won’t see her next week, but I will continue with my home exercises and yoga practices for hip and sacrum stability.  I have scheduled once a week check ins with her through the end of the year.  I’m doing much better – but I’m not “back to normal” yet, so therapy with guided exercises will help me get there.  Re-training muscles is hard work, in case you were wondering!

I’ve got a lot to be thankful for this year, but I really am thankful for the body God gave me and how resilient it is.  I pray you each have blessings abounding that you are also giving thanks for.

Image result for Thanksgiving scriptures

 

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Counting Recovery

It is not quite 2 months since my surgery.  If you count days of the month, then tomorrow is 2 months.  If you count weeks, today is the end of the 9th week of spinal fusion recovery.  If you count weeks another way, Monday marks the start of the week 9-10 of recovery.  It’s kind of like vertebrae and disks – if the day is the vertebrae – and the disks are weeks – there is a week before and a week after.  I think at this point, I’m ready to just start counting MONTHS.

So I’m at 2 Months post op.  As I sit here today recounting my recovery, and reflecting on my progress – I feel “pretty good”.  I’ve made tons of progress of course, like I talked last week – no more walker, cane, back brace.  My discomfort is manageable.  I recognize that I have physical limits on what I can do, and my body does a good job of telling me when I’m pushing those limits.  But if I don’t do a bit of pushing, I won’t make progress, and I understand that too.

What am I doing?  Well, since you asked…I’m using a fitness tracker app to track my steps and other activities throughout the day.  It varies by day, but I generally get some combination that adds up to 6500 or so steps.  I don’t know the algorithm or logarithm that tells it that 15 minutes of stretching equals 1321 steps, but I look at it from an “overall activity level” .  For the record…that’s up from 250 steps a day the first week after surgery! Ha!!!  Anyway, I got on my exercise bike yesterday for 10 minutes, I did a 20ish minute yoga video and about 5 minutes of additional back stretches, and ended the day with a grand total of 6618 calculated steps for the day.  I try and use my lunch hour at work to go for a quick 10-15 walk, and then a gentle yoga video and some stretches.  The rest of what I do is just my moving around at work and home.  I’m trying to get into a routine of getting on my exercise bike more – since that is easier on my feet than tons of walking.  But mornings…ugh.  Trying to find the discipline to get up a little bit earlier every couple of days and pedal while the coffee brews…that’s my goal.  I enjoy my yoga during lunch time as well.

Last year while considering my fitness level, and my back pain level, I was researching yoga – but honestly, as a Christian, I was feeling a little bothered by the “Eastern Philosophy of Yoga” – the chanting and ooooohhhhhmmmmm – the stereotype I assigned in my head to what I thought about yoga.  And then I stumbled on a website that was Christian yoga practice.  Lots of information, some time in prayer, and a few websites later, I had reset my internal bias, and was ready to spend some focused time on a yoga mat WITH GOD.  And so for the last many months, I have been combining bible study, prayer, and yoga to my lunch time routine.  My favorite website and “teacher” is at www.carolinewilliamsyoga.com .  I’ve even exchanged emails with this beautiful woman, and she is by far my favorite Christian yoga video instructors.  A few of her guided meditations got me through a couple of rough nights early in my recovery, too.  Having that spiritual, faith-filled connection was vital when I needed to get through a pain flare.  Anyway, there is actually quite a community of Christian yogis out there.  If you too have been reluctant to think about yoga – I encourage you to do your own research, but I would hope that just watching one of Caroline’s many videos and listening to her bible study and prayer in EVERY PRACTICE, will convince you that just maybe, yoga might be a good fit for you too.

Alright, so next week I have my first appointment with my physical therapist.  She incidentally is also a yoga instructor, just FYI.  When I worked with her before for an issue with my upper back/shoulder she had me doing some yoga stretches then as well.  I hope that while working with her, I can get some tips about what modifications I can make to some poses, as I regain some strength, stability, and flexibility in recovering from this surgery.  I’m sure she’ll have me doing more than just yoga, but I’m hopeful we can work towards a sustainable long term plan to help me keep my back as strong and comfortable as possible.