Last Saturday, twenty-four weeks since the fall, I moved back home from The Ballard Landmark Assisted Living Facility. This was my first time back home, . . . it's been a while!
Because our home has steps leading up from the sidewalk to the front yard and more steps to the front door (with similar obstacles approaching the back door) there was no way to make it wheel chair assessable and so returning home was dependent on safely traversing steps & stairs. I am now doing this (carefully) in spades. When I get up from my desk and head to the break room for coffee I tack on a couple laps up & down the indoor flight of steps to The Mountaineers top-floor meeting room.
Marijane moved my clothes and the other stuff that fit in boxes, and Dolly.com moved the bed, night stands, table, and chairs. Thanks again Marijane!! Dolly.com deserves a shout out as well. If you haven't used them yet, it is like Uber for folks who own a truck and for folks who need a truck. It was incredibly easy (and cost effective) to schedule a micro move, and the two helpers who did the "heavy lifting" were timely, friendly, and professional. Couldn't ask for better. If you need a truck and folks to move stuff for you, Dolly.com is a great way to go.
The complication has to do with one of the things I talked with the back doctors about at my six month visit last week. Everything with the back is fine (and they were pleased with the most recent set of x-rays), but there is a lump/bulge on the side of my abdomen close to the 6" incision which allowed access to the blown out vertebra (so they could pull out the shards, and replace it with a titanium cage). The bulge doesn't hurt at all, but it has altered the shape of my torso enough so that pant waists no longer fit.
It could be that the nerves in the vicinity disturbed by the surgery aren't yet firing and so muscle tone isn't consistent across my abdomen, but more likely it is the result of me doing too much in-bed leg-lift physical therapy with leg casts which caused a hernia. Yikes! The back doctors gave me a referral to the side-opening doctors (interesting note, . . . as it turns out a different set of doctors actually opened me up and moved all the internals out of the way so the back doctors could do the vertebra replacement work) who are also familiar with hernia repair and I'll visit with them next week. Once again under the knife!
It ain't over 'til its over . . .
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