A Sunday Morning Update - Part I
Another long-overdue update...not much time in Spring for keeping a Journal online. The last month (when it's not raining) it seems all I do is MOW, MOW, MOW. "Smallville" is a 7 acre paradise...I have about 1 acre in active pasture, 4 acres as hayfield, and the remaining 2 acres (in the center of the property) is my house, patio and LAWN. Tom and I made our first major purchase together at the end of April -- a brand spanking new Kubota T-2080 lawn tractor -- and I have been mowing up a storm with it. My old lawn tractor is 10 years old and it would just about beat me to death on a good day. Since my back injury last fall, I have had to be really, really mindful of doing anything to aggravate it. There was NO WAY I was going to be able to keep up with the lawn care around here and still walk if all I had to mow with was that old red one! So after doing our research online, we ran up to the nearest Kubota dealer and bit the bullet for the R-2080. This thing has got ALL THE BELLS & WHISTLES...including (I have to laugh) CRUISE CONTROL! Who ever heard of such a thing on a lawn tractor?? I have too many hills and banks here to ever use it... But the BIGGEST SELLING POINT FOR ME was that it has the PATENTED AIR-RIDE SUSPENSION. Oh my gosh! What a HUGE difference it makes. It takes me about 2 hours to mow my lawn and now I can do it all at once and not have to crawl back to the house. Wow! So between mowing with the Kubota and my New Holland D-29 (a full size diesel tractor) I am able to keep up with the grass around here! (I use the New Holland to mow my active pasture and to keep a "safety zone" between the fence and my hayfield so when my neighbor comes in with his haymaking equipment, he doesn't have to get precariously close to my fence.)Ok, now that you all know what I've been up to, here's an update on this BACK THING that has been dragging on and on and on.The Orthopedic Surgeon released me a few weeks ago. Dr. Michael Dabbah is the doc who fixed my fractured vertebrae the day before Thanksgiving using a technique called "Balloon Kyphoplasty." That absolutely gave me almost instant relief from the Sciatica pain, but even though I continued in Physical Therapy through March, things still aren't right. I have been able to identify a lot of nerve pain the last two months, and just when I was about to give up, my cousin told me about the Advanced Pain Management Center right in town! I got really lucky in that I only called for an appointment on June 1, they had a cancellation for June 4 -- I said I'LL TAKE IT!Had to hustle the orthopedic practice to get copies of my records, original X-ray and MRI, but I got it all together and went to my appointment on Thursday. This is a specialty practice run by two Anesthesiologists and is part of Carroll Hospital Center. Dr. Torres was very nice; a personable guy with a good sense of humor. I found that I could speak very candidly with him and once he figured out that I done a lot of research in the prior few days, he got down to the nitty gritty with me. It seems that I have some "other issues" going on with my spine other than just recovering from the L-2 lumbar fracture. He showed me on the MRI where I have some disk issues and also some possible Spinal Stenosis! Instead of being horrified, I just asked him "Can you help me?"The answer was a resounding "Yes. I most certainly hope so."So....on Tuesday morning June 9th, I am going in for what is called a "Nerve Block Audit." Dr. Torres will isolate nerves in certain areas of my spine using an MRI and ultrasound and inject those nerves with (I don't know what). The test takes about an hour and I will be given Valium IV just to relax me, and the discomfort is minimal. Then, if the test works (in other words, if the areas injected get numb and stay numb) two weeks later, I am scheduled to have Permanent Nerve Blocks done to all the areas that tested well on the right side of my spine. Three weeks after that, he will do the left side (three weeks only because of the July 4th holiday falling in there).Before I left, he wrote that he would be doing T-11 through L-2 vertebrae because I had strongly indicated that most of the nerve pain I was having was in the upper right quadrant of my back. However, in the last couple of days, I think his first impression was more accurate and I am going to phone over there on Monday to let them know I would prefer to do the LOWER AREAS. Yesterday, I realized that the nerve pain I talked about that was higher, is because the lower pain causes me to move my body all wrong! So after the procedure, I will have to update this journal with the actual procedural facts.In the meantime, I continue to do as much as I can do around here. I have been riding a lot and did two long trail rides with some friends on Memorial Day weekend; a 10 mile ride last Saturday; four short trail rides with my neighbor and this morning, I am meeting three friends at Morgan Run NEA for a two hour ride. I have been riding my black horse the most, as she is my "steady Eddie" and I know she's not going to do any jumping around or too quick movements. I have been on Memphis twice and have been working him in the round pen when the footing has been dry. But in the last couple of days, I have decided to sell him. He's a really terrific little horse and I love his quick way of going. The accident I had last fall was absolutely NOT HIS FAULT, but I have realized that since this last injury, I want a quieter horse. Trail riding is best done "on the buckle" (in rider's terms that means "riding with a fairly loose rein"). I put an ad on Dreamhorse.com yesterday; have to upload the pix I took of him yesterday. Tom really likes Memphis, but he's too big for him...and I already have another one picked out! Horses, for me, are like potato chips -- you can't just have one!Will keep you all updated this week as to how the nerve block test goes. Wish me luck!
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