@vze1n191 Hello and welcome to Connect. I am a cervical spine surgery patient, and I have to tell you that healing from spine surgery takes time and patience. Your surgeon is not going to let you do lifting for quite awhile. My limit started at 10 pounds and I had only one level operated on. Your surgery covered a lot more cervical levels and was just a few days ago. Because your shoulder muscles and scapula muscle connect to your spine, they will exert a force on your spine that could be injuring to the surgical sites that have just begun to heal. It takes about 6 weeks for just the incision to heal and right now you have a lot of inflammation from surgery. You will need to ask your surgeon what you can and cannot do and they will need to clear you for increasing physical activity. Your post operative abilities may be different than your past abilities and that is something that spine patients have to accept. After healing the wounds, physical therapy can help.

I have communicated with another patient on Connect @birdman518 who had developed C5 palsy after a cervical spine surgery. I found some medical literature indicating it is a risk from the surgery because the C5 nerve root is shorter than other nerve roots and it can be affected. You can read our conversation. If I remember correctly, physical therapy may have improved his C5 palsy. This post has the medical literature that I mentioned.

I know this isn't the outcome you were hoping for, and it may take a lot of time to heal and work through it. I would think your surgeon would be willing to send you to physical therapy for this when the time is right.

Jennifer