Ignore my last update. I don’t know what I was thinking about “pain management” and the like. My disk was sticking out 12mm and crushing my nerve. I decided I didn’t want to “manage” that. I wanted to get rid of it. I got rid of my “pain management” doctor–who was the most useless, indifferent, judgmental, absent-minded doctor I’ve ever seen–and talked to my previous surgeon about removing the entire disk altogether and having hardware put in to elevate and stabilize the vertebrae. He highly recommended it because of the severity of the rupture and the position of the two vertebrae (collapsed on top of each other). He referred me to a new surgeon who specialized in the TLIF surgical procedure:
Understand spinesurgery (animations)
Click on “transforaminal lumbar interbody fusion (TLIF)” to view the procedure. The video is broken into parts, so as you finish viewing one part, you will have to click “next” to view the following part.
I had the procedure done last Thursday. I’ve been home since Sunday, and I’m improving every single day. The excruciating pain in my left leg is completely gone. (more…)
