6 Months

As September fades away, I realize the month marked 6 months post-surgery.  Most of the time I'm pretty positive about things, heck, I have good reason to be happy where I am right now, but there are times I get frustrated I can't make my nerves heal faster.  However, as I've reflected on things, I realize I really have come a long way since March.

At the very beginning of March I had no idea what kind of tumor was residing in my spinal cord.  I really only knew my body was not happy with it.  The analysis after surgery gave the evil sucker a name, an ependymoma, and it was benign, thank goodness!

Immediately after surgery the one thing I noticed was the tingling.  My entire body from the neck down was pins & needles and it felt like I had a metal band squeezing around my midsection.  After getting over that shock, I realized more than half my fingers were numb and I couldn't get them to do what I wanted.  The surgical site was tender, but oddly, to me it was a good kind of pain and not the terrible pain from the tumor.  In the hospital I needed help getting around, heck, I needed help to use the bathroom and brush my hair.  About the only things I could do myself were brush my teeth and wash my face (and that was only possible because of those cleansing face wipes)!  I could feed myself, but it was messy and some of the food gave me difficulty (not to mention that hospital food sucks, its so bland, but that's a whole other topic).

I experienced my first ambulance ride from the hospital to the recovery center, they're very bumpy.  It was there where I, at the ripe ole age of 32, learned I would need a shower chair and a walker, and for a time, I even had a wheelchair.  I still needed help with just about everything.  Modesty wasn't an issue, there was no choice, I couldn't do a majority of basic necessities on my own.

When I got home, in addition to the tingling and numbness, I realized how much we use the little muscles in our neck.  The first time I bent down to put a fork in the dishwasher, I thought my head was going to explode and fall off.  When I tried to lean over the bathroom sink to wash my face...I couldn't bend real well or hold my head up at that angle for too long, and made a huge mess of soapy water.  My occupational therapist suggested only buying small cartons of milk as a gallon would be too heavy to lift.  Since my fingers weren't working too well I pulled my socks up with my thumbs and index fingers, with the remaining fingers sticking straight out.  We went out and bought several pairs of yoga pants because I couldn't do buttons on pants.  I had to take the stairs up and down, one slow step at a time.  I couldn't put my own hair in a pony tail, turning my head and getting my fingers to manipulate the hair band were too difficult.  I cut 4 or 5 inches off my hair just to make life easier.  I had a TON of help with Sebastian because I couldn't hold him as I had no idea how tightly I would be squeezing him, and I couldn't pick him up, or lean down to play with him.  Bathing him?  Forget it.  Impossible.  The simple act of holding a fork was a challenge.  My fingers just did not want to cooperate.  My mom had to write checks for me to pay the bills, I couldn't even hold a pen.  And driving?  Well, I couldn't feel my feet, so that was out of the question.

That was in March.

Shall we take a look at the recovery process now?

I'm driving.  I bought, not one, but TWO gallons of milk yesterday.  I'm back in the gym, I've been cleared to lift light weights and do the stationary bike and elliptical machine.  I want to run, but my left leg/foot are still numb, so I pose a risk to myself on the treadmill.  I can do my hair on my own, as well as putting on makeup again.  Hello liquid eyeliner!  I'm able to give a 20 pound squirming toddler a bath on my own.  I don't feel my head will separate itself from my body when I load the dishwasher.  I've begun keeping a journal to work on my writing.  Oh, and I went to Disneyland a few weeks ago and rode Big Thunder Mountain and Space Mountain!

Basically, to look at me, I really don't think you'd notice anything different.  The remaining healing is all nerves.  Of course there's a wicked scar where the neurosurgeon went in, but it's on the back of my neck and I have long hair.  My fingers are still numb, but I have much better control over them, pretty much the only uncooperative finger is my left pinky.  I'm able to tell temperature in my left hand so I'm not at risk of burning myself with too hot shower water.  My left leg still tingles and my foot is still numb, but it's nowhere near as bad as it was.  Sometimes, and I think it may, in part, be related to hormones, my symptoms increase a bit, but they almost always decrease again within a week or two.  My doctor said they could get worse before they get better so I'm always hopeful that's a good sign.

In general, I feel like I'm making good progress, but this has been a crazy lesson in patience and I am so not a patient person.  If I'm honest, I do wonder if one can become depressed from lack of sensation.  It's one of our major senses.  But, when I start to feel like that, I remind myself that a tumor the size of a shelled peanut was removed from inside my spinal cord.  If the healing process feels like it's taking forever, well, my body probably didn't like a brain surgeon operating for five hours in such an important and delicate area.  That's a lot of progress in a six month time span.  Of course, me and my impatience would have been just fine if all this healing and mending could have taken place in the span of, say, six weeks, instead, but, so far, so good.  Let's just hope the remaining healing can speed the heck up, because, yeah...still not patient and I want to shake the numbness, regain the missing sensation, and totally, 100% feel like ME again.  Are you listening nerves???  I'm talking to you.  I don't miss that tumor and neither should you.  :)