@lioness I get it. Thanks! I have so much empathy, I can feel the pain that someone else is experiencing. I had to learn to give myself allergy shots, and I give them to my husband too. I've told him not to react if it hurts, because, I will feel it too, and I don't want to jump when I'm doing this. I'm glad you can relate to the story. I really listened to my body and had tracked my symptoms as they developed over time, so I knew going in that the surgery would fix it all. I know a lot of people do not have that level of body awareness. I knew from the first MRI that I would need surgery, and in seeing every doctor who turned me down, I was learning how to face that fear. Even though I was disappointed, I was also relieved because I escaped again. I was getting worse, and the last one who turned me down did upset me and I had invested so much energy in preparing to do surgery with him. That's also how I knew that I would be able to get through it. I had tested my sketching idea making a drawing of him off a website and showed it to him at the last appointment which made him giggle, and in that moment I realized I could do this. Later, he declined to help me, so he never received the drawing, but I had a plan on what I could do meeting a new surgeon at Mayo, and you know how that turned out. I guess sometimes we thank God for unanswered prayers. Because it turned out this way, I had a bit more time to be with my dad who was dying, and I got the call to come to Mayo right after he passed.