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Anyone had Spinal stimulator removed? Replaced?
Spine Health | Last Active: Jan 8 7:15pm | Replies (42)Comment receiving replies
Good afternoon @texasaviatrix, Welcome to Connect......on behalf of another person with a broken tailbone. I am so sorry to hear of that misfortune. Do you have any idea why the pelvic pain was responsible for the tailbone removal? 17 years is such a long time to cope with and manage chronic pain.
Before we go any further, I just want to let you know that I also suffered a broken tailbone. It apparently happened as a part of or result of pregnancy. I had some surgery to protect my cervix from premature labor. However, I did not become aware of the broken tailbone until much later (7 years or so) when hunting for the cause of back pain. I do not recall any medication except Celebrex and then a laminectomy. I remember that pain and discomfort and the limitations on my life.
Sometimes, we just are better off letting sleeping dogs lie. Finally, I ran into a medical technician/yoga instructor who taught me two simple exercises/poses that kept the pain away until this day. Your account may be totally accurate and the resulting condition needs to be addressed.
What is your best temporary (3-5 hours) solution for pain control? How are you sleeping? Can you meet with a pain specialist before the surgery to give you an idea of your options?
Good luck to you......please check back or just give us a quick update. We wlll be here for you.
Chris
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Hello Chris and thank you fir your reply.
To clarify, I am not currently contemplating any surgery. My tailbone was snapped off at the sacrum and shoved up into my body as a result of a hospital accident. We can only assume that I was dropped while I was unconscious, probably when being transferred from the operating table to a gurney for transport to recovery. I say that, because there was no record of anything bad happening to me and it was my word against theirs. Although I came out of the minor surgery with severe lower back pain, I wasn’t diagnosed until 5 months later.
The pain was so severe, that I was basically bedridden until I found a neurosurgeon who was willing to remove the tail bone. The surgery and recovery was a success, and I thought my troubles were over. It’s a VERY long story, but in a nutshell:
I developed new pain about a week after the surgery. I’ve been told that I have everything from SI joint disfunction to periformis syndrome, a luxated pelvis, and cluneal nerve entrapment.
I’ve had everything from physical therapy to chiropractics, Accupuncture, too many cortisone injections to count, every anti-inflammatory, muscle relaxer and pain med known to man and multiple nerve ablations. I had a morphine pump for 8 years (which malfunctioned 6 years into its life) and then swapped it for a spinal cord stimulator 4 years ago...which had been absolutely useless.
The only short-term relief I get is by taking a combination of morphine and hydrocodone. I can only take it once a day, so I save it for evening, when the pain is at its peak, so that I can get some sleep. That’s the short story. I’ve had 3 pain management docs. When the second one ran out of things to try, he announced that he was taking me off all opioids (my only relief) because I’d “been on them to long”. Now my third doc tells me he is no longer prescribing them because the government is making it too hard to do. I have to find another doctor within two months when my meds run out. This is no way to live.