Hey everyone,
I’ve been reading through posts here for a while and I just wanted to say I have so much respect for all of you. I don’t think people understand what it’s like to live with spine issues and go through surgeries like this unless they’ve seen it up close. It’s a different kind of strength.
I’m writing this because my dad is about to go through another major spine surgery and I’m honestly scared.
He’s already had two big surgeries. His first fusion was about 30 years ago, and then he had another major fusion more recently. The last one was really bad. He almost didn’t make it through. He’s always been in pain, but ever since then, it feels like things have never fully gone back to normal.
He’s 64 now and has been in constant, excruciating pain. Not the kind you can push through, but the kind that wears you down mentally and physically every single day. Watching someone you love live like that is brutal. Watching his body degrading is terrible because I have no way to help him. He can’t even fish with me or walk long distances like when I was a kid. It feels like it’s taken over his life.
Everything escalated over the past 5 years and he ended up in the hospital with sepsis. While they were trying to figure that out, they did imaging and found something pressing on his spinal cord. There’s inflammation and fluid around the spine and they couldn’t rule out infection. They even saw air in the spinal canal, which I’ve learned isn’t normal.
Now they’re talking about going back in surgically to relieve the pressure on his spinal cord and clean everything out, and deal with the hardware, and extend the fusion.
He keeps saying he doesn’t think he’s going to make it through this surgery, and after what happened last time I can’t just brush that off. I’m trying to stay calm for him, but the truth is I’m scared too. He’s the strongest person I know but watching him go through this is breaking him.
I think the hardest part is the uncertainty. Not knowing if this will finally help him or if it’s going to be another long, painful road. Not knowing what his quality of life will look like after all of this. Not knowing if he’ll survive. And just feeling helpless watching someone you love go through so much pain for so long.
If anyone here has been through revision spine surgery or multiple fusions, infected fusions, etc I would really appreciate hearing what it was like for you. Did things get better? How did you deal with the fear going into it?
Even just hearing that people have made it through something like this would mean a lot right now.
And seriously, I just want to say again I have a ton of respect for everyone here who deals with this. It’s not something people on the outside really understand.