I thought I’d give a little update. Tony, I really appreciate your input. I don’t think I have ever listened to my body, and have always played through injuries if possible. With all due respect, I just turned 56 last week and would kill to not have to give up my passion until I’m 78. I’m not playing baseball for the first time in 50 years, and the thing that keeps me going at the gym through my weakness is the desire to return to the diamond again. I don’t care if it’s 2 or 3 years from now. I will try to avoid back surgery though if I keep improving. It’s definitely a bigger risk than hips or knees that have worked out well for me.
I just saw my neurologist today who is happy with my improvement since he last saw me over 3 months ago. He doesn’t want to see me again for a year. He swabbed my cheeks for a couple of genetic tests to see if my toe neuropathy could be genetic since they can’t figure it out and refuse to attribute it to my L4-L5 severe stenosis. I am finally having more good days, and the bad days usually don’t last the entire day. I get 2 to 3 hour bouts of fatigue instead of entire days. My upper body strength is probably 90% of where it was a year ago. My legs are around 60% only, but just started improving about 3 weeks ago so I am finally hopeful. I can tell my nerves are firing again because my lower back nerves are stabbing me occasionally. That’s where my dilemma comes in. How much should I push myself to get my thigh strength back. My thighs are visibly caved in on the outside. It is worse on the left side as I had a knee replacement 6 months ago on that side. I can see no way to get my thighs back without putting weight on my lower back. I have started slow with 145 pound squats on a machine, 125 pound modified deadlifts, and was able to push 230 pounds on a leg press machine. I was doing less than half of that weight a month ago. All of a sudden, I feel like my muscles are responding instead of feeling fatigued after just warming up. It’s like my compressed nerves somewhere in my body are finally getting some room to breathe or something to that effect. I still have a long way to go, but I didnt have much hope until this month.
Mary, I also thank you for your input. I see you said my MRI reports are pretty normal for a guy in his 50s, but the word severe is listed twice in 2 sections of my lower lubar spine. Is there something worse than severe? A lot of my baseball friends who have back pain state they have moderate issues. I also think I’ve been playing with the severe stenosis for at least 5 years with more and more ibuprofen every year.
I still haven’t got around to getting my thyroid biopsy due to 2 separate stupid medical systems not being able to obtain my ultrasound records. I finally have them being mailed to my home by next week and can then get the biopsy with my new endocrinologist. Also, one of my new improvements is the fingertip clubbing as you called it. It is still there, but it takes a lot more to bring it out like ridding my motorcycle for 30 minutes or carrying something heavy for awhile. I used to bring it out by just making a fist for 5 seconds. As you stated, I will get to the bottom of this. I have a second opinion upcoming with a new spine doctor in a month who actually performed a couple of surgeries on Peyton Manning. I will post another update after that visit as I hope to help others who like to compare their symptoms to mine. Of course, I am improving almost across the board from just rest and slow, sensible, persistent trial and error exercises. Not to mention, nothing was really working for 4 months. I now have hope again.