@richlub Even if you never had surgery, you may have tight fascia in your body that causes some kind of compression to tissues. It can be body wide. For example, I have tightness that extended from my neck and jaw through my rib cage and into my pelvis. It is tighter on my left side, and it tends to pull my pelvis out of alignment and pulls one of the "hip bones" forward. That gives me some low back pain only on the left side, and that is when I know to try to work that out. It has caused my jaw to be too tight, and I wore out fillings only on the left side of my jaw. It can cause the left side of my ribs to not expand as much as the right, trapping phlegm and causing a chest infection because the left lung wasn't moving enough. Many people have tight muscles in their thighs, myself included. I also had surgery for a fractured ankle 3 years ago and it was a bad fracture. The first surgery attached a metal cage to the outside of my ankle screwed into the tibia in front and the heel bone on the sides. That created scar tissue that adheres to the bone. The second surgery was fixation with titanium plates, and the third surgery a year and a half later removed that hardware. Those scars are tight and pull into the ankle and for a long time caused my ankle to suddenly weaken and collapse while I was walking. After working on that very tight scar tissue, I was able to make that better, and even though my ankle fatigues, it isn't collapsing now. You have to consider your posture, and the positions you sleep in. If that is causing a "slouch type posture" because your body isn't supported well, that can also create a pattern. I was always sleeping on my right side. I do try to alternate now, to stretch out the left side while sleeping.

For your questions on spine post op improvement, I felt pain kind of right up to 6 weeks, and then it was like you flipped a switch and I wasn't in so much pain, but it felt tight and stiff. I still had fatigue and slept a lot. At 3 months, I really felt good, but at that point I had to rehab for neck weakness. I choose not to have hardware , so I stayed in a neck brace until it fused at 3 months making my neck weak, and that tired me out a lot just holding my head up. A couple months later after therapy, that felt a lot better at the 6 month mark. It takes patience to get through all this. If you stress over it, you'll just cause more pain and it's going to take the time it takes to heal anyway.

The absolute worst pain I have endured wasn't from spine surgery. It was from an epidural injection. I got a sharp electric pain into my hand during the injection and I was starting to convulse. It was extreme pain and it was running away with me. I had worked a lot on overcoming my fears of all of this and had developed a routine of deep breathing to music, and visualization of images in my head, so I started doing that in my head, and I brought myself back from the brink. I was well on my way to passing out, but I was able to regain control, and stop that from happening. This was before my spine surgery. It was from a diagnostic injection. I think I was allergic to a component in the injections. I had to live with stabbing electric nerve pains for a couple months that were very intense and random except that if I moved, they increased in frequency. Gradually they became less, and all I could do was just lay down, prop my arm on a pillow and try not to move. Pain relievers and prednisone did nothing for this pain. Nerves take a very long time to heal from insults like this. I had cold sensitivity in my hand for a year and a half.

This was a big learning experience for me because I had always feared pain. So I learned that I could handle it. After my spine surgery, pain meds just nauseated me, so I didn't take them and I was able to handle the pain without them. It was healing pain which was "good" pain which was different from my preexisting spine generated pain, and not the pain caused by fear of the unknown, and I knew I had regained control of my situation. I think I was still improving up until a year. It takes time to overcome the fatigue when your body directs all its energy to healing, and I had to strengthen my muscles. Riding my horse at a walk helped me strengthen my core strength and all the spine muscles which helps my posture and contributed to my healing. I began that at 7 months post op with my surgeon's blessing. I know it may not seem possible to calm your mind, but you can do it if you design a routine that works for you. I know you want to get back to work and can't do that right now, and worrying about that will probably cause stress. Give yourself permission to take a break from the legal stuff and just focus on yourself right now. It's like you have a puzzle with pieces scattered around and it will take time to sort it all out and see the whole picture.

I guess what I can say for a plateau is that if I don't continue to self treat with MFR, I get more tightness and that causes arm pain because of TOS. One side of my neck is tighter and can spasm and rotate my vertebrae independently, so I have to straighten that out or it causes headaches, jaw pain and even dizziness. Stress will trigger that for me. I used to have more physical therapy on an insurance plan, but I have to be on Medicare now because my husband retired, so I can't just go to PT unless I can demonstrate a need to fix something functional because Medicare doesn't want to pay for maintenance. Since surgery my spine has been stable and I have been pretty much the same from the one year mark onward and I'm now at 7 years. I had one damaged level that was collapsed by 50% before surgery. I know you have a lot more issues with your spine and collapsing discs that are beginning to fuse themselves. Try not to think of yourself as a diagnosis of all of that. After you get through the first part of your recovery, you can figure out what your next steps will be.

I hope in all of this, there are a few pearls of wisdom that you can use. You're not alone, and I hope that these discussions can help you in some small way.

Jennifer

Am am optimist by nature and always try to be ahead of the curve recovery-wise. I had a Laminectomy and Spinal Fusion surgery from S-1 to T-10 15 months ago. I wish I could tell you that my experience was positive but I am still experiencing pain and mobility issues. My neurosurgeon sold me that because of the nature of my surgery it might take up to a year, as nerves take longer to repair themselves.

Here I am 15 months out and am still in pain and have pretty significant mobility issues. I went and got another option from a spine specialist who after having me get an updated Lumbar MRI and CT Scan told me that the surgery “did not take” that I needed to have possibly a ALIB, I believe it is, to fix the screws that are loose in the lower lumbar area (S-1) and also at the T-10 vertebrae. Today he me doctor said that it was probably leas than a 50% probability that I would be any better from a pain standpoint. Recommended that I see another orthopedics spine specialist who performs procedures for spinal stimulators, which hopefully help relieve at least part of your pain.

I know that it may not be the encouragement that you would like to have, but I had been looking for some kind of forum or support group who actually has gone through their own back and spine issues. Kudos to Mayo for providing this kind of outreach. Sure beats hearing your neurosurgeon tell you at all the follow up appointments that “well you had major back surgery and it will take time”.

Hope you have a much more positive experience than I did. I have tried to use my circumstance to see the positives in life where I had been too busy to see them when I was running full board at Mach II with my hair on fire !

Onward and upward …….