Recovery ... Still

So I know it has been forever since I have written.... which kinda defeats my whole purpose of writing this blog. But I have never been so exhausted. I guess it is part of this whole recovery thing. I guess I feel a bit guilty, like I should already be back on track, but I honestly am not. I am still in a decent amount of pain. It is different than my normal pain, more like a soreness that cannot be relieved. I try to put on my game face for my new job, and then try to keep some sort of normalcy at home for my fiance who has been my rock through it all. But all I really want to do is rest.

I had my last Doctors appointment about a week and a half ago and I wish it went better. All my incisions are healing fine, but I am still not getting maximum relief. My rep tried to reprogram me for almost two hours but we still could not get good stimulation on my upper left. It was pretty obvious that she had somewhere else to be and could not work with me any longer. She said that I would just need to keep meeting with her to work on the left side and hopefully we would get better results as time passed. It is disheartening, but I am doing my part. All I know is that in my heart I have put forth my best effort and I will keep trying. Thankfully, no more surgery is needed and I am no longer spasming. I knew when I got into this that it was not a fix all. Just something to help me get by, so I try to keep that in mind.

My scars are much worse now since they had to reopen all but one. I will post pictures this week of what they are looking like now. It is kind of depressing to see the thick red lines that mar my back, but it is part of my struggle, so they are part of me. I am happy to report that I bought my wedding dress. I will not be ashamed of my scars and I will not hide them. They are part of my story ... I only hope that with time I can shed the pain that has brought me so many scars. I have hope and determination that with time it will all fade. I want to thank all of you who have supported me through this rough time in my life. I really appreciate it.

Revision Surgery Update

Hello all. Sorry it has been so long since I have written. I have started a new job and am still recovering so I have been too tired to write. I cannot say yet if the surgery was a success. I need to get some reprogramming done and that won't be until next week. The surgery itself was pretty terrible. I ended up having the left and right leads revised. I went in under some anesthesia, but they ended up having to reposition the leads so many times that they had to keep me awake for the majority of the surgery. They would tell me they were about to go in and I would grip my Saint Jude Reps hand and just brace myself for the pain each time. At one point my Doctor said that he was going to just have to remove everything because they kept getting the motor nerves. At that point I clearly remember saying to him "Please no, this is all the hope I have." At that point he continued to try for four hours until he finally found placement. The surgery was only supposed to last for one hour. In recovery I found out they had to re-open the battery site as well which I was pretty disappointed about. I went in at 9 am and was finally released to go home at 5pm. Thankfully they gave me stronger pain meds. I knew the next day was going to be a battle. Unfortunately even the strong pain meds couldn't match the torture my body had gone through the day before. I felt like I had been severely burned, beaten with a bat, and then dragged by a semi.. but I knew the severe pain would only last a day or two, as it did. I was able to start my job 6 days later and I can say that this surgery was not as debilitating as the last.

Am I happy I did it? Yes, because like I told the Doc, this is my only chance. Wish me the best. I will let you know the results as things progress.