Saturday, January 1, 2011

Hi ho, hi ho, it's off to the surgeon I go!

It didn't take long for me to get an appointment to meet my surgeon. About 3 months or so... in the medical world, that's not long at all lol. Unfortunately I didnt get to meet him first, instead I met a scrawny little resident who almost went flying across the room!! He was about half my size so I knew I could take him! (That's if my mom didnt get to him first haha.) He made me feel like I was starting at square one again, questioning if my symptoms really were true or not. The scrawny pip-squeak tried to tell me that my eyes were the problem... I really had to hold myself back from letting him feel the wrath of The Jenny! Apparently he knew more than my Neurologist.. his simple "touch your nose, then my finger as fast as you can" game told him the true problem and the MRI lied... HA! He also decided to fill out the medical questionnaire based on his own thoughts. My piercings magically didnt exist and I never had any minor surgeries before... I couldn't help but cringe at the fact that this guy could someday be a doctor!

When my surgeon finally walked into the room, he confirmed the MRI results and requested yet another MRI. (Take that little resident man!) This one was to be an hour long and it's purpose was to show the flow (or lack of) of the spinal fluid through my spinal cord and brain. Now, I am very clastraphobic and had a difficult time with the first MRI which was only 20 mins, so you can imagine how I felt when I was told it ws going to be 1 hour long... yep I freaked!!! How was I going to handle laying perfectly still for 1 hour long and not freak out in there? See the first time, I did a really stupid thing: I opened my eyes.. never open your eyes! After 10 minutes, I wanted out of there so bad, but I knew I had to stay in there. This time, I brought a facecloth with me and put it over my eyes. That way I could open them if, for some reason, I decided to and I wouldnt know how close the machine was to my face. It actually worked well! Unfortunately the earphone over my left ear had a plastic part that dug into me. The tech did not listen to me, nor did he help me. He didnt give me my button to even get his attention. Instead, he yelled at me for moving and blamed me for the issue. I reported him!! His boss was not happy at all!

Finally I got the results of the test in October.. they found a syrinx in my spinal cord. It is caused by the lack of flow, which results in the fluid pooling in the spinal tube. Eventually this could (and usually does) lead to paralyzation. Ther is permenant damage because of the syrinx. This is the moment I knew I definitely had to go for the surgery. I met a surgeon from CHEO who was consulting me on behalf of my surgeon. An hour and a half later, I completely understood what was happening to my body and mind. This is the reason for my numbness and pain in my limbs and it wasnt going to go away. I will eventually have to have another MRI to determine if it is shrinking and the fluid is flowing again. It can take up to a year for it to shrink.

I wanted to have the surgery in May as it would be nicer weather and I would have a bit better coverage through my insurance. However I was told I couldnt wait. While the surgery is classified as "Elective", I was considered "urgent". They wanted the procedure done prior to 3 months. I signed the consent forms that day. My next step was to call his receptionist the following day and see when I could be scheduled for.

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