The last few months, I’ve gradually developed lower back pain and other symptoms that suggested that it was time to revisit my neurosurgeon. Yesterday I finally had my appointment with him. I did not actually wind up seeing him; what was discussed during my pre-meeting with the physician’s assistant made it unnecessary.
Unfortunately they did not have (and I couldn’t find) a copy of my latest MRI. I will be going today to get that to bring to my next appointment—which will be next week! Based on my symptoms and what test data they do have, they think it sounds like I need some surgery to relieve pressure on nerves in my lower back.
The specific areas where the back issues seem to be correspond directly to the nerves that run to the parts of my legs and feet that hurt the most. In other words, assuming the MRI I pick up today and bring in next week says what they think it’s likely to say, I’ll meet with the surgeon and we will start planning a procedure. It could be just a removal of bone growth that’s pressing on nerves or a full-on fusion procedure. The latter, they say, would likely take “up to a year” to recover from fully. We’ll know soon what we want to do…
I’m excited that there is again something that might work. I am trying to contain my enthusiasm because when I get too enthusiastic about this kind of thing, it fails and I wind up depressed…