Hi Guys,
Wanna compare notes here with all the experiences of those of you who've had back surgeries. I sincerely believe I will now finally need some type of surgical intervention. Want to explain what is happening now and see if to you it sounds like I will likely need surgical intervention.
My two injuries at play here are as follows:
- 1995 Went over the handlebars on my DualSport. My Coccyx and Saccrum got pummeled probably about as hard as you can pummel them without them actually breaking. Ever since, I cannot lie on a flat hard surface directly. It's uncomfortable to the tailbone.
- 1997 - Moto - On a small very vertical jumping surface, the kind that launch you more upward with very little horizontal, I got too sideways and was gonna come down that way. Not wanting to drop a brand new DirtBike I extended my leg and braced for the impact of returning to the ground. It worked at righting the bike moments before landing and not crashing... but it jammed my leg like heck into hip socket.
Ever since these two things, like every time having sex happens to be missionary and the knees are spread outward like that and that type of pelvic movement, I hear/feel the grinding feelings and sounds.
I had been good about going to the Gym up until about 45yo. A shoulder I'd already had repaired was feeling like it wanted to rip on me again... and then.. while out hunting in 2015 I shattered my wrist, which required 13 screws on a plate that sorta looks like a Gillette Razor. The pain in that wrist quickly becomes "a thing" whenever ya try to push any respectable weight around. It hurt my pride and frustrated me so I stopped going to the Gym and instead just focused on hunting/scouting. Also I was noticing that on squats I was favoring now away from that one hip socket noticeably, so then started to do Deadlifts more. Than on one of em I rounded my back a little on a very heavy one. And felt that Coccyx/Saccrum injury really not like it in a strong way. So I stayed away.
FastFwd to today:
I'd already been noticing on longer hikes, especially steeper ones, that my lower back and hip area would become very hobbled. So I'd do my usual of besides the everyday Rx NSAID I take (I had rheumatic fever as a kid, so my joints aren't great, plus these injuries), adding 6x200mg Ibuprofens on the return trip out. Then... I started pestering my doc for Tylenol #3's to help deal with it so I'm choking down less pills. Now just 6 in the am, then when the pain starts to come in bad and i start feeling hobbled, take a Tylenol #3 to continue limping on back outta there.
Then this year happened. Boom Flu... then Boom Covid. It hit me hard as hell and caused a huge amount of inflammation. And with all the coughing and inflammation, when a big cough would hit, my inury area would literally want to give out underneath me! That was scary. So like Beg of April I'm finally in the clear and starting to go back out hunting/scouting. Only now... this pain is really problematic now. It hurts to sit. Like even when I'm going to a location where I can use the nice REI Flexlite Macro chair for my ambush sit... now I'm STILL in pain from the long sit afterward! At first this was happening because I was using the Tripod stool, so I chalked it up to no back support and long sit times. Also the lumbar pad on my pack.. and the way it makes me have to loosen and lower my T-Buckle pants belt REALLY aggravates my injury area, seemingly now more than ever! (it was always kind of an issue, but usually the letting the pants belt be significantly loose would help prevent the lumbar pad from grinding my pants belt across that injured area) I spent time contacting Kifaru explaining my problem and double-checking that the fitment was right. Which it seems to be. I lowered the shoulder straps as much as I could so as to help lift the lumbar pad to its highest point upward in fitment.
Speaking of long sit-times, I work from home and do Software, so that's another problematic contributing issue here.
So anyway... this year, this pain is freaking hobbling and crippling now! When I return home I'm mamed when I get outta the truck! And I continue this way for like 5 days afterward. And need to put additional cushioning on my work chair and do more leaning forward to alleviate the pain/pressure to my injury area.
Also contributing to less activity this year was the slow demise of my one dog from the cancerous tumors. Couldn't walk her like before, so Daddy also got less walking. And my other dog is tiny, and just as old as well, so she doesn't walk enough distance either. We had to put down the one Dog in June. And now the other one is presenting with the beginnings of similar tumors so surgery was scheduled, but then skin infection sites found on her so Vet injected her with long-lasting antibitotic and me rescheduled that surgery. Then a slab leak happened in the damn house. They repair, but now it seems to be having moisture coming back up thru that patched cement, so they gotta come back out and redo it. Grr.
I've got a referral to get an MRI. Then tentatively after that refs for a back specialist and PT.
So for you guys who've been there done that, does this sound sorta like your situations? Where you then noticed that pain was there all the dang time, just to varying levels?
