I had an appointment today for the weird shit going on in my cervical spine, with the same surgeon who did Tim's back surgery. The PA and the surgeon both remembered Tim, which isn't surprising, because his surgery (well, surgeries, plural) were a doozy!
And now that I buried the lede, guess who else gets to have surgery? Our insurance is going to be so surprised that it's *not* Tim. Man, I had really hoped it could be fixed with a steroid injection.
Though honestly, the surgery doesn't sound too bad. First of all, it's outpatient surgery, so that's awesome. The surgery addresses 2 levels of vertebrae (the discs between C4 and C5 and between C5 and C6 are bulging, and that made the space in the spinal column really really narrow and it's smooshing some nerves), so they go in and take out the part of the discs that are bulging, put a spacer thingie in to make sure it doesn't get narrowed again, stitch me up, and send me home the same day.
So now I wait for the scheduler to sort out our insurance and coordinate an OR time and the surgeon' schedule, and then they'll let me know when the surgery is.
That's wild that they can do that. I hope it's super easy on you!
I am backing down on buying the plane ticket. There's other more responsible things I should be spending money on, I feel like I need to at least think about that a little more
Is that the same kind of surgery you had before, Steph?
Is that the same kind of surgery you had before, Steph?
Really similar, except when I had it done for my lumbar vertebrae, they didn't put in a spacer thingie to prevent the narrowing from reoccurring. I don't know if they were doing that in 2003.
The only thing I really dislike is I'll have to wear a neck brace for at least 2 weeks, and that's going to be super annoying. But my brother wisely said "You'll be stoned on pain meds and rewatching Moon Knight and that alien show you like,* so that'll take your attention off the neck brace." Which, fair point.
*(He forgot about the gay hockey show. And maybe I'll do my annual pre-Christmas Hawkeye rewatch early.)
I don't know whether to hope you get put on a billboard again or not...the plan for coping with the neck brace sounds excellent!
The alien show is Roswell, right?
I didn't get a spacer put in when I had surgery in 2017.
I don't know whether to hope you get put on a billboard again or not...
If anyone deserves to be on a billboard, it's Tim. His recovery from that surgery—and the massive amount of curvature/structural correction the surgeons were able to do—was rock star caliber. I just have a cranky neck that needs some stabbing to get it to fall in line.
The alien show is Roswell, right?
Yes, and I know he knows its name; he just likes to be a dick. Plus it's his actual birthday* today, so he has free rein to be even more of a dick.
*My little brother is fucking 50 today. Nothing makes me feel older. My own age doesn't actually make me feel as old as my baby brother turning half a century. Jesus.
