I am new to this forum, although not new to spine problems.

Around 12 years ago I had a lumbar fusion & laminectomy for bad stenosis, pain from my waist down, loss of reflexes in my ankles & also a synovial cyst in my spinal column. It was a success & I went back to work, lifting patients in my nursing job until I suddenly developed terrible back & pain in 1 leg. Turns out a screw was pinching a spinal nerve. It happened suddenly although I had no one injury or lift that did it - I had some degree of pain every day that I worked & lifted patients.
The first surgery was on L&I, I could not prove a work injury due to no 1 incident - so the 3 level fusion I had last spring was not.

My course this time has been very hard, my pain is worse, CT shows scar tissue & stranding (I am a nurse but not even sure what this means) and MRI shows a disk fragment. My surgeon & his clinic have been no help, they have an across the board policy that everyone comes off all restriction at 3 months, can lift anything, and should go back to work. No pain meds after 6 weeks. I would be happy to be off pain meds & go back to work if I could. I am in too much pain, my sleep is very poor at night, I take very minimal pain med - only 1/2 pill a night so I can sleep. It doesn't get rid of the pain but takes it down enough that I can - although sometimes I am unable to sleep for hours.

I can hardly ever talk to him or see him - I did not see him once until my 6 week check. He did not round on me when I was in the hospital. His nurse said he looked at my MRI, that there was no disk fragment even though this conflicts with the radiologist report. She then said he told her there was no difference between the 2 MRIs - I asked her "you mean there is no difference between the pre-op and post op MRI? Because that is the only 2 MRIs they are referring to, 1 pre surgery and 1 post. She just stammered and said yes. I feel they are lying to me, and not being forthright at all.

The doctor honestly told me that if I were a Seahawk, he would send me back to play football. How many pro football players get a 3 level fusion and go back to tackle or block? I can hardly lift 15 pounds without severe pain, but he would have signed off on me being able to lift 50 pounds so I could return to work. It is only because of my physical therapist standing up to him, that I was able to extend my leave from work.

I am nearing the end of the max time I can take from work, and at that time I will probably lose my job. And my health insurance. I am thinking of applying for social security disability - I already have disability from my employer as I had signed up for the optional disability insurance. But I am pretty sure my surgeon will not be supportive of me applying for disability. They already have a policy where they don't complete physical capacity forms - they had my PT do it (and then wanted to ignore his findings).

Am I right in thinking my chances for getting approved social security disability are nil with this doctor? I really don't know what to do. It seems all doctors just protect each other - they may say your spine is a mess here let me reoperate, but no one wants to say Dr. X did a bad job for fear of winding up in court. How do I find a doctor who will be more honest & also hopefully advocate for me? I am nearly 55, I am in too much pain to work or hold a job, let alone be of any use to the patients who would be relying on me. My medical bills are terrible and I am afraid of just racking up more fees for nothing.

Sorry this was so long. Thanks in advance for any words of advice.