I had surgery on September 6, 2012. It's been 8 days since surgery.
Surgery wasn't bad! I went to the hospital that morning a nervous wreck, shaking, IBS symptoms, the whole deal. They couldn't find a vein to put a saline lock in because of my nerves and dehydration from not eating. So, they tried in about a dozen different places all over my arms. They eventually said they gave up, they'd do it after they put me under.
I asked the anesthesiologist to give me something for severe nausea, as last time I had surgery, I threw up before I even woke up, and threw up the rest of the day. He did, and I didn't have any nausea when I woke up! I did have a terrible case of "the shakes" but I'll take that over puking.
I didn't feel anything on the left side of my back (which is where they were supposed to be slicing), but I had a terrible muscle cramp on the right side of my low back. It was so bad that I was convinced they had cut into the wrong side. They had to show me a mirror before I believed they actually got the right side.
Anyway, woke up with no sciatic pain. Got up and walked before bed because it seemed to really help the muscle spasm on my right side. I was pretty slow-going. Shockingly slow. I had to spend the night for some reason. I felt fine, but they convinced me to stay by offering me better drugs, so I stayed. I finally convinced them to take out the catheter after I had gotten up and walked quite a few times. I was not happy about the catheter.
The next day, I woke up with just a shadow of sciatic pain, not bad, but scary when you've just had a surgery to get rid of it. I asked the neurosurgeon about it when he was discharging me, he said it was normal for a few days. OK, so I dealt with it, it was still SO MUCH BETTER than it was the day before.
As the days have gone on, I've been having gradually more and more sciatic pain, but it's yet to reach pre-surgical levels. I was told the reason is threefold: 1) the steroid pack is wearing off slowly, 2) the surgery only removes the car door from the hand, so the hand will still hurt for awhile, so-to-speak, and 3) it's directly correlated to the size and length of time the herniation had gone on.
I've been taking ibuprofen, hydrocodone, Flexeril, and oxycontin to help offset the pain. As I write this, I have no pain at all, but I am lying down.
What activity am I doing? Walking whenever I think about it, and the doctor gave me 8 stretches to do for 2 weeks while I recover. So far, no back pain at all, I don't even feel the incision anymore. Still, my biggest and only complaint is my leg pain.
