So today is the two-month point after my spinal surgery. This is the point where, for most folks, recovery is mostly through. My surgeon wants me to take an extra month, since my job is fairly physically intense, but if I had a desk job I should be, theoretically, able to go back to at least part-time, low-impact work ( Read more... )

It's almost surreal how decent I feel today, especially given just how invasive the surgery I had was. But I'm recovering from it more smoothly and easily than any of the other (significantly less aggressive) surgeries I've had ( Read more... )

Home from surgery, in one piece (even if I'm held in that status by screws and bone plates), and doing my best to rest comfortably. Thankfully, everything went well ( Read more... )

Okay. The insurance company finally came through and agreed to cover the surgery, the surgeon's office called to confirm the time and the procedure, and everything seems to be ready to go. Tomorrow at 9:45am I report to the hospital, to have the vertebrae in my neck fused in two places ( Read more... )

I just finished my last day of work, at least until sometime next spring ( Read more... )

I feel like my life has become rather one-note lately, and that one note has been my health problems. On the other hand, with me mostly not-working (about to become completely not-working) and most of my hobbies taken away by said health problems, I'm having a hard time having much of anything else in my life ( Read more... )

As of this morning, I am officially insured. For real. Really. No last-minute hiccups, no lost paperwork at the insurance company, no failure for the employer to file, no oops-we-gave-you-the-wrong-number. I have health insurance again ( Read more... )

Apparently it is much harder to deny and/or ignore a stern-voiced male than it is a young-sounding female, especially when that female is doing her best to be as conciliatory as possible after past negative experiences.

After my week of calling and begging and nagging my health providers, umbran took on the task of calling the Pain Management Center for ( Read more... )

So today I got to add something new to my list of Things I've Experienced In My Life - I had my first epidural injection (in my neck; slightly different from the caudal epidural anesthesia that people think of when they talk about women in labor ( Read more... )

First things first - thank you all so much for your support, good wishes, and for reinforcing the fact that the problems I'm going through are neither imaginary nor atypical ( Read more... )