With the traction weights they started me at 3 pounds. After that I got an additional 2 pounds every morning and one pound in the evening till I hit 20 pounds. I stayed there for 5 days and then went up one pound a day to 30 pounds where I stopped. My first full day in Halo traction was super hard. My head hurt so badly!! Angela had spent the first night with me and left late that morning. Between nauseous episodes I was able to take a shower and they taught me how to do pin care. That evening a good friend of Angela’s good friend came to see me, Ellen. She was super sweet!!
That night was the first night I slept in traction, I was at 5 pounds. I had an awful night! I cried and cried! My nurse was really sweet. When she gave me my pain medicine (Loritab) she unhooked me from my traction and said she’d come hook me up once I fell asleep.
That next day I stared my physical therapy. I started walking on the treadmill, still hooked to traction, at 5 minutes. We go to PT twice a day and they increased my time by 5 minutes every walk till I was up to 30 minutes. Then they started to increase speed. I was amazed; I never got short of breath!
Day 4 I got some bad news. My resident came in and told my surgery dates had been moved back. They were moved from April 14th and 26th to April 21st and May 5th. When she told me that it took everything for me to hold back the tears, I was so upset!! At this point I was really miserable! All I wanted was to go home!!
My first weekend Angela came up and spent Saturday night. She helped me wash my hair, which is NOT easy to do with a Halo. I almost passed out in the shower. I think it was a combination of my stomach problems and all the pain medicine and standing up too long. It was so good to have her there with me. Sunday when she left was hard. I quickly began to realize I was not expecting it to be this hard!
It took me about a week for the headaches to go away and to get off the hard drugs. After the headaches came the neck pain. But what should I expect, I mean I’m literally being stretched!! They gave me this “rice neck pillow wrap” they heat which helps a bit with the neck pain. Eating was another problem. I had no appetite at all!! Everyone kept telling me I had to eat. I knew that, I just couldn’t do it. Especially with the food being as gross as it was! But again within about a week I started to get my appetite back and I was figuring out what to order and what not to order.
Then the eve of March 1st I got some more bad news. They had discovered a hair stuck in one of my pins sites. I don’t understand how that happened. They shaved the areas. I woke up at Children’s with chucks of my hair in the bed. I started running my hands through my hair and more was coming out. In a still drugged state I almost started to cry because I thought my hair was falling out. Anyway, the doctor came in to tell me in the morning they were going to take out the pin, remove the hair, and replace the pin all while I was awake! I was terrified!!! I called Angela of course. That was when our motto, “do it scared” came in very handy.
The whole thing was very interesting. They gave me 2 Percocet an hour before. The tree painted on my ceiling started to move, I was very high. When the doctor took out my pin I thought that hurt. Then when she was digging around for the hair and trimming the hairs around the area I thought that really hurt. Then when she put that pin back in I have never experienced pain like that in my life!!! It hurt SO badly. 1 to 10 scale . . . about a 10,000!!! It was the most painful thing I ever experienced! Thankfully the pain was very short. As the pin was being tightened it felt like my whole head was exploding from the inside!! Afterwards I got to rest out of traction for 2 hours, that was great. Then my nurse came, woke me up, and made me get in the shower. Of course the drugs hadn’t worn off so I almost passed out in the shower for the second time! Very scary feeling! Of course the person to come in was my least favorite person and she acted like I was overreacting. Really lady? I almost hit the floor.
It took about 2 weeks for me to be able to get some decent sleep. It was hard at first with everyone coming in through the night to give me medicine and check on me. After that stopped it was the issue of getting comfortable. That was a big challenge for me, a very wild sleeper. As soon as a way was discovered for me to sleep on my side my neck was at the point where it made it too painful for me to turn at night. So now I’m left sleeping on my back and occasionally turning to one side. But at this point I just lay on my pins and it doesn’t bother me like it did at first. Thankfully the back of the Halo is open so sleeping on my back is a bit easier.
The 13th was a very exciting day! I had no idea it would be when I woke up. First of all my doctor found it too painful to see me play chutes and ladders because there was nothing else to do, so she went out and bought me origami stuff. What doctor does that?? Then came the huge thing! My nurse came in and asked me if I wanted to see my x rays. Of course I said yes. I went into the nurses’ station where my doctor had them pulled up. At first glance I couldn’t see much difference, then I saw the numbers. I asked if they were for real. My doctor looked up at me smiling and said yes. My x rays from the week before showed my 123 degree curve. The x ray from a week later showed my 89 degree curve!!!!! I almost cried when I saw it! That is a HUGE improvement! I could tell by the way they were acting they were surprised!! God is so good!! Seeing those x rays makes this all seem easier!
Then yesterday there was some new drama, not the good kind. In the morning when I was swallowing my pills the first one I attempted to swallow got stuck. It was weird, it wasn’t like I was choking, it was stuck in the side of my throat. I started to panic. It hurt really badly. I tried coughing but it didn’t help. Between the pain and the fear I had tears running down my face. I started drinking, a lot, trying to get it to go down. My nurse yelled for someone to call a code something and get the doctor up there right away! That was scary!! As I was drinking finally it came up. I didn’t try again till lunch and they went down fine. I had been having a bit of trouble swallowing but attributed it to my neck position in the traction. I talked to the doctor later who wanted to see if it got worse. Then before bed I tried to take my medicine, it happened again. It was pretty much just as scary. This morning I was not given any pills. The nurses are supposed to wait till the doctor figures out what to do. I’m still hoping it’s just the position. If not it’s being caused by one of the pins. They are inserted into the cranial nerves which can potentially cause problems. The doctor is going to come in later today. I’m pretty anxious.
So that’s pretty much all the good details up to now. I probably should have started this sooner. All my posts will not be this long now that the important things are caught up.
I’ve got to get headed to PT. I can't wait till I recover and can start running!!!
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