Well it’s been a long week getting ready for the start of a new year complete with a trip to the surgeons office! As many of you know I’ve spent a majority of the summer dealing with an infection in one of the incision sites in my back. The news was mixed and in a couple of weeks time I’ll be heading in again for another procedure. At least this time all it will be for the time being is a trigger point injection, or in my words ” a shot”. The surgeon wants to try and avoid having to open my back again but still may have to. So in order to try and control some of the pain he is going to give me a cortisone injection.

When I asked him what he thought may be going on, and why I’ve been having so much extra pain he told me that he figured my back hasn’t healed yet. The good news is that it looks like we’ve caught the infection, but he wants to give it another few weeks before he can confirm that. We still can’t be sure of what’s happening inside. The last couple of days the pain has been really intense, and I’m trying to take it easy and give things a chance to settle. What better place to go to relax than the lake, which is where we are headed first thing in the morning.

The last few months have been packed full of challenges as we try and save the implant from having to be taken out. If any of the infection gets onto the wire that’s implanted in my back then the implant will have to come out. At this point it looks like we’ve dodged a huge bullet and it appears that there’s nothing on the wire. We are still keeping a real close eye on things for the next little while.

Obviously I hadn’t planned on having to deal with something like this when I had the surgery done, but the reality is that complications like this can arise and you need to try and deal with it the best you can. So I guess you could say that through the entire implant process I’ve had experiences of two extremes. My implant for my lower body was a great experience with little or no problems after the surgery. My upper limb implant has been a challenge right from day one! The setbacks have been many but in the end I know it will be worth it.

Numerous times I’ve been asked if going through all of this has made getting the implant worthwhile. My answer to that will never change, it will always be YES! Let me ask you this. If you are able to reduce your pain by any percentage doesn’t it make it all worthwhile? Even if it’s only the slightest of reductions you’ve still managed to bring the pain down. So I’m always looking through to the other side of things, and I just need to get through all of the hicups! For now it’s time to get my mind off all of this and enjoy the lake!