Yeah, I know, Mark - I just need to know ahead of time a little of what to expect so I can try to plan accordingly. I've already been told the "12 weeks of no bending @ waist, twisting, lifting...etc." As it is with most workin folk I am limited on how much time off I can take so I need to work out that with my employer as well.

Tonight my wife said something about wondering how much time she'll need to take...will I need someone here w/me for that first week or so? Just how much does this put a guy down? I'm quite young for this procedure - I understand most folks are 60's or so and I am about 10 years younger than that...hoping that'll work in my favor.

I was mid fifties at implant as my handle suggests. I am a working Joe as well, need to keep those bills paid, and all. So, short of referring you to the original iteration of the thread I started which is now in the stickies to find the read deal.......

anticipate really being down about two weeks, depending upon your implant issue. Wife may need to help you for a week if you are a strong guy as I was at one time [my bulk was more muscle then, and I still give it a go [as I like pedalling my bicycle]. My implant included a laminectomy, the removal of bone to make space for insertion of paddle leads. If your implant will be percutaneous leads, then the mid-back insertion point should be a lot more likely to recover more quickly.

With the laminectomy, I had serious business similar to the discectomy/laminectoly/fusion I had at early fifties from the doggone car wreck. Now that earlier surgery was like as if my body had been sawn in two and it was pulling apart at every movement [even the elimination kind]. The laminectomy was less intense, BUT, I still had severe pain for about 10 days, then it tapered off. I will tell you, the pain meds I was on were additional to the usual pain management meds, so there was no way I could work at that time..... I dropped the additional surgery meds by end of week two. Then it was a process to wean off of all pain management meds so I could resume work. That honestly took about three months, very controlled, because it was a lot of meds and doc did not want me to deep six on him.

Really, it depends upon the pain meds you have been using to manage pre implant. Doc knows best. Your family knows. My wife is also my guardian and GUARD, unwilling to let me be stupid as testosterone is prone for me to do. You get the drill. So, allow someone to drive you to work if you are allowed light work. Mandate number one from my wife. Phone home if you begin to drop like a rock thrown into a pond early in the afternoon and you truly cannot handle the pain. Your wife and your body will tell you. That was my wife's Mandate number two. Her third mandate for me was pretty much, translated as don't be macho dumb. Because in my younger days I was known to achieve some things the body should not be able to do.

So, what do I have for you right now? If you have the implant soon remember BLAST and Logroll.... they help in those first weeks. Then, listen to your wife and your body. You will know it too much is too much. Above all, I will send my prayers.

Mark56
Yup

Cannot stress enough the importance of the leads getting scared in the placement they were originally placed. By doing things and/or twising, you may cause the lead to move and scar in a positon it was not meant to be. That can cause a world of problems. Not worth the stretching, etc.. Get a
grabber so you don't have to reach high for things.

Other than your doctor, Mark is the closest thing to an authority of what to
do and what not to do.



(Gerry)

She was feeding horses too soon afterward and figured lead migration occurred which cause one of the leads to completely dislocate from the position in which doc had placed it.

A lot of stuff to weigh in the balance, I know, when you need to work to provide for the family.

Compassionate,
Mark56

Went in to have the Medtronic guy tweak the temp - my hope being with this final tweak I'm being thoroughly blessed with a 98%-100% relief. Unbelievable after so many years. I seriously don't know what I'll do without this bondage!

Okay..back to the subject at hand. I am 50 years old and in relatively good health. I am a PC Technician by trade - as in if you break it, I fix it - physical, hardware/software/infrastructure techie (I love one of my tee's that says, "G E E K" On the front then a dictionary definition on the back...and Microsoft on the arm! Fits me to a TEE! (tee-hee)). Nice thing is I'm the senior guy and my boss has told me I have as many as 50 strappin guys at my disposal to help if I need assistance with moving ANYTHING. What a blessing to be so appreciated by one's employer...just another one of those "pour out the blessings on this fella" that the Father loves to do. Any-who, we're now shooting for August 17 for the implant since my response to the trial is so awesome. Meds? Yeah, I've been 'physically dependant' for many years as I gave up "just dealing with it" some years ago and decided to break down and have meds to help me live my life. Don't know how many are famliar with Nucenta but that's what she's had me on most recently. It's a next-gen cousin to the old Oxycodone molecule - slightly stronger in some people, not as strong in others. I am NOT on 24-hour control as I can deal with the pain at night when I'm at rest. I've been kinda determined not to do 24x7 as I knew that would make even more dependant.

So, doc says, "Oh, you'll be a little sore" to which I laughed and said, "Yeah, 'a little sore'...you doctors LOVE to down-play procedures" to which she and the receptionist started laughing. Sorry, I digressed there a bit.

Bottom line, I can't really get much of a feel from her on how disabled I'll be following this thing. What will I need for my general care?

As for what you said about work, Mark, I hear ya...problem is, sure, I can get a ride to work but once I'm there...I'm there. Very little opportunity to duck out and head back home. You make an excellent point of not trying to jump back in full time after just a week. I think I need to chat w/my boss and see about maybe taking 2 weeks off and see if she'll let me do some work remotely from home. I now have all the tools necessary to do anything remotely to any computer on the network...only thing I can handle from home, of course, would be a physical replace of a piece of hardware and I do have a backup that has the keys/access to the hardware lab. Sorry I'm really rambling here but writing it out is helping me think it through.

Thanks for sharing a Readers Digest version of your story...I also have a bit of a 'curse' in that I have ADD and find it very difficult to make it through an extremely lengthy thread...I pretty much read no books at all except the Bible and commentaries on such. School was extremely difficult for me especially since back then they had no idea ADD even existed much less how to teach a kid with it.

*whew* I went all over, there ... sorry!

More than anything, Mark, I appreciate your committment to say a prayer for me. God alone has gotten me to this part of my life...that's for sure. I should be dead or in jail...but He had a better plan for me.

Hey Andy,

Pretty exciting that you have a date scheduled for your implant surgery! You can be sure that you'll have a bunch of us here praying for you the whole way.

Regarding work, is there any way you can go back to work half-time or part-time for a few weeks? When I had my fusion surgery I was teaching special ed and had some very active little guys and girls in my class. (I have a special place in my heart for anyone with ADD or any other kind of challenge!) I had to take 3 months off work completely, then went back half-time, and it was kind of do-able for me at the time. I had other complications with recovery, so eventually had to go on disability, but at least I was able to continue working for awhile with a reduced schedule.

I too was very fortunate to have an employer who was willing to allow me to cut back on my hours as necessary. I did all the paperwork at home, which helped everyone get through that recovery time. If you know anything about special ed paperwork, it amounts to a huge amount of filling out all those lovely government forms--IEPs, progress reports, etc. Anyway, it's just a thought. Maybe your employer could work something like that out with you.

So happy to hear that you're getting such great pain relief!!!!

God bless,
Jan

Thanks for your thoughts and prayers, Jan. There is some digital paperwork in my field but mostly it's not quite that easy. Since I can remote into my work system it's as if I'm there except for my phone that is inter-connected to everyone within the company we deal with (from the US, to Spain to London) but even that I can work around. As for the infrastructure the one thing that is of concern is if they need some 'boots on the ground' for something with one of the various components. (I won't bore with all the various component names - just suffice it to say I provide various levels of support for the 60+ desktops on down to 5 servers - and everything in between) and a large portion of that is not accessible by my backup.

I have a feeling how soon I can return will depend on how soon I can drive myself there/back. I don't see part-time as an option if I'm car-pooling. My beloved works in the opposite direction of where I work and our home is about in the middle. Starting to think I just need to take 2 weeks off and be done with it...maybe by then I can drive myself for a part-time return.

I suggest that you plan for being out of work two weeks. When I filled out my short term disability form that's what my surgeon wrote down. Depending on your pain tolerance, the specific area your implant goes, how much wrestling the surgeon has to do to your back muscles, and a lot of other things you may be off meds within a few days or you may not.

I was able to work at home part-time from the sixth day after surgery. It took about 17 days before I was comfortable through a full work day at the office.

It is cool knowing your work is computer oriented and the scenario in which it plays out. I am way familiar with IT staff and rack rooms and the whole rigamarole of pulling cable, setting up racks, cable flooring and the like in a cool room facility as I have seen it all in play given my prior work history.

So, you can surely direct others to do the twisting, reaching and lifting because you have the expertise to direct the tasks. That is the means to return to work under light duty. Golly, you will have just had sutures removed at two weeks. Just take a look at some of Saffy's thread posts here to see photos of burst suture locations. It is an ugly and infection prone site.

If you get BLAST and log roll down, you can surely help yourself.

We will see how it goes for you and you will be prayed through this,
one who prays,
Mark56

The setup is finished - that was some L O N G hours, building out the 5 servers, all the patching/cabling/etc - then going up and physically setting up all 55 desktops each with 2 LCD's, etc. That's all behind me - now it's maintaining said equipment. Even the patch-closet where our floor jacks are patched into the switches is about as optimized as it's going to get so no real issue there if I'm off for a couple of weeks. Our main issues now is dealing with the backbone of the network which is seated in the U.K. Don't know if you have any experience with their infrastructure but it is a PAIN because of their limitations on bandwidth across their nation...so I battle with them on a regular basis to get our tools working to where we need them.

It's frustrating watching the traffic do MPLS hits from Texas, to Alabama in the low single-digit milliseconds then it hops 'across the pond' and hits the UK border and it's like it hits a brick wall (in comparrison). Then our support takes most of the traffic right back over to the US to our end users. I have yet to figure out who designed and approved such a foolish model!

(Sorry for going way off-topic there, those that are non-techies - I'll stop!)