I have to have spinal surgery again (my 4th one), to take out all the instrumentation and put new ones and MORE back in. In the past I always woke up to the pain writhing and hyperventilating because they could not control it well. The only time I remember the pain being controlled was the first time because I was naive to pain meds. Every time after I have explained to everyone involved about my meds and they have always promised me they would be able to help me control it. I understand they can't take it all away, as we all know, but they were always afraid to give me more than the highest dose they would give a normal person not used to narcotics. It has been 9 years since I had a spinal surgery but only 3 1/2 since a c/section. In that time you would think the medical professionals would have learned from the past and how to deal with chronic pain patients. Also, in the past, they never had a pain management doctor in the hospital to help me, but consulted with one before, to no avail. This time however, my spinal surgeon has PROMISED me, yet again, that there will be a pain management doctor in the hospital to help him help me with the amount of pain meds to give me after the surgery. I asked my PM doctor to consult with my surgeon, and he has, but he does not go to the hospitals so my surgeon tells me he will use the suggestions from the in-hospital PM doctor instead. I asked if I would be able to consult with the in-house PM doctor BEFORE the surgery and I was told no, that there would be no need to, and my surgeon has dealt with CP patients and they did okay after the surgery. They wait until after the surgery to see what you need. Has anyone ever had to do this and does this sound how it should be done. I don't know, I would feel a lot more comfortable talking with the PM before to make sure that I see the understanding in their eyes and to give me a game plan and what to expect. What if I am so incapacitated I can't even communicate with them afterwards?
Can anyone tell me what you went through if you had a surgery, and how the pain was afterwards, and if they did do something to make sure you did not want to kill yourself from the awful pain.
I have to have bone harvested and more fusions done to my spine because L5 is not fused to S1 and is still slipping forward pulling my spinal cord with it. They are going to try to reduce it (pull it back into alignment), but even that has it's risks. I don't want to become paralized by my vertebrae slipping forward and cutting off my spinal cord at the L5-S1 level so I have to have this surgery. This is the 3rd fusion attempt. The first one was in '98, I was 22, the second one in '01. They have fused it from the front the first time, and the back with instrumentation the 2nd fusion attempt. I am so scared, not only from the pain perspective, but also because the first time they cut a blood vessel in my stomach and I almost blead out. They could not find where all the blood was coming from, but finally did and reinfused it to me to save my life. My brother told me when he came to see me after the surgery that I was so white that I looked dead. He had to run out because he could not stand to see me that way. I had no idea at the time that anything like that had happened. With all the scar tissue it seems like something like that could happen again, or worse. I guess I am just so scared of everything, that is why I have put this off for as long as I can, (5 years or more). I am too scared of the pain after the surgery, but now I don't have a choice. My surgeon told me this is the last chance I get to save my spine and hopefully fix it right to where I can function again with less pain if we can get it to fuse.