Recent L5-S1 fusion

Your idea of a diary is great and I started one yesterday. It certainly will be helpful.
I hope your recovery continues daily and thank you for your information and suggestions.

Best,
maddiemae

I'm sorry you haven't felt much progress regarding your surgery. It is possible that there isn't full recovery but I would be grateful for 80 %.
I have a great surgeon with a wonderful nurse who is talking me through my concerns and worries so I'm very lucky in that regard. I see my surgeon on October 27th at which time he'll take an x-ray to see how things look. He's scheduled me for hydrotherapy beginning October 31st.
I hope you can get some relief and perhaps develop a relationship with your doctor.

Thank you for your message and intellectually I know you're right. I'm just coming from an emotional place. I'm anxious for my follow-up appointment with my surgeon. When he tells me everything looks good I will definitely feel much more positive about all of it. Part of my problem is dealing with the pain coming from my hip and knowing that I'm facing 6 more months of chronic pain.
Yes, I'm working on having a more positive attitude - a good thing for healing.
Best.

Unfortunately my surgeon is very passive and unresponsive. I feel I am just being left to my own devices on recovery - once the surgery is over the surgeon could care less how I recover. I appreciate the exhortation to have a positive outlook, I will try, but I cannot settle for 80% or less than a full recovery. I am very determined to get into a better physical state than before this surgery which put me into a situation that I feel very uncomfortable and anxious about now.

I truly do understand your anxiety and frustration. I have it, too. All of this has caused me to stay in bed and sleep way more than I should. I'm an avid reader but my pain level and frustration have prevented me from reading for about 3 months. I really want to get back to it because if I'm not sleeping I'm staring at the walls. I want to go outside to walk but I'm upstairs and maneuvering the stairs is tricky and my husband is not always available to help me. I'm using a walker and sometimes a cane depending on how badly my leg hurts. It's a huge challenge for me to have a happy attitude right now but I hope I can reach that place soon. This recovery is so long and so hard and it's just awful that you have a surgeon who doesn't care about you and your recovery. The surgeon's involvement is key to recovery, I think.
How long ago was you're surgery? Don't get me wrong. I'm hoping for a 100% recovery, too.
I hope things improve for you soon.
Best.

@maddiemae Oh thank you. I am doing fine. My cervical surgery was 7 years ago.

Have you heard the saying about how do you eat an elephant? and the answer is one bite at a time! Recovery is like like where you take small steps and wait. The bones may not fuse for 3 months. That was how long it took mine in my neck to fuse so they were stuck together, and that is confirmed with an X-ray. During that first 3 months, my body was building the matrix (first with cartilage) within the scaffold (the bone disc implant) and beginning to populate that with cells that would start to deposit minerals to form bone. At first, just the spacer disc is fused to bone above and below it, but after a few years, it looks different when bone extends past the spacer and joins the vertebrae surfaces together. That is happening for you now on a bigger scale because L5 is a larger bone being fused to the sacrum.

It makes sense to wait 6 months at least to make sure the spine is fused because with a hip replacement, you'll need to be able to move for your rehab therapy. I'm guessing that right now, walking is difficult and painful.

Are you wearing a brace now to help keep your back straight? It's not so long until your follow up with your surgeon. Will your surgeon be sending you to rehab after your fusion process has begun?

Hi. I had laminectomy and l4 To s1 fusion and unfortunately both failed. They tried everything, water therapy to try to get better range, and it worked but as soon as you walk out of the pool and your weight comes back down on your body it was like a ton of bricks. So my advice is just take it ready coming out of the pool. And hope it works better for you

I feel for your situation, and I hope for your full recovery as well. I have never been through this kind of ordeal and agree that surgeon involvement would be helpful in recovery as I feel I am without a tether. I guess there is no harm in being positive notwithstanding the challenges and lack of clear path to recovery. I just know that the one thing that will make me positive for real is the elimination of the ongoing pain, mobility limitations and sensation of a lump of cement in my spine.

I agree that improvement is difficult to measure - it seems so incremental and maybe it is. My biggest concern is that every time I move I'm afraid I've broken something. Just did it a minute ago and I imagined feeling metal moving. And I'm with you on the chronic pain thing. It's hard and I don't think anybody would disagree with that.

I've come to understand that this seems to be a 3 month at a time process. I'm so anxious to see my surgeon on the 27th for my follow-up. I just need reassurance that I haven't done something awful to the fusion.

Yes, lots of pain still. My doctor hasn't given me a back brace yet but I think he will and hydrotherapy begins on the 31st.
Thanks for your support.