Sunday, March 20, 2011
New Post
Well, now that I've said that let me tell you everything has been going great with one exception. I have been fighting the worst nerve pain for sometime now. I've tried a half dozen so-called nerve pain medications that had little or no effect. I'm not one for sitting at home and drooling on myself so your medication that is normally prescribed for pain I'm not interested in. It's in my butt and mainly my tailbone area, which is about the worst place I can have it at. Other than that, my health has been pretty much tip-top. I recently went back to India for my fourth trip in December. My father went with me and we had a wonderful trip. It sure was good to see all my old friends. As always, they were pleased to see my improvements. My hand functions are coming but at a very slow pace. Better thumb movement is present. I wouldn't say I have finger control just yet. They are kind of in the flickering stage if you know what I mean. My upper body strength continues to build. Core strength has improved enough where they took the top part of my calipers off. Now they go just past the waist. I still wear the belt to tuck in my butt and also a binder around the waist for additional support. Nonetheless, a big step to my recovery. I was really able to initiate good steps with my old calipers. I was getting good movement from my hips going forward and really good movement going backwards. With the new setup it's like starting all over again. I'm really starting to initiate good controlled movement with my legs. My trainers are all confirming this. I am able to roll from my stomach to my back easily now, which may not sound like much but is a huge accomplishment. I was able to evacuate urine from my bladder on my own on a couple different occasions. Nothing consistent though. I am able to evacuate my bowels better on my own as well. Sensation with my muscles strecthing and and tightening has increased. That all being from the chest down. Progress is slow but steady. As always, headed in the right direction.
Wednesday, April 14, 2010
Good Third Trip
Monday, February 22, 2010
Great Progress With Week One
Friday, February 12, 2010
India Trip Three
Saturday, December 5, 2009
Holiday Season
As soon as I returned home from India it was back to work. I still work out three times a week with my trainers, use the direct current electric stimulus, the FES bike daily, autoambulator gait trainer once a week, asnd have also added standing daily in my leg calipers with the use of my new pair of parallel bars. I have been pretty consistent with all of my workouts, but again sometimes find myself having a hard time getting motivated to make myself do what I know needs to be done. The progress that I have shown has been steady, but nothing that has been really earth shattering. My strength continues to increase in every area, some areas faster than others. There are a few things I have discovered I am able to do though that are pretty amazing. While sitting in my shower/commode chair I am able to draw both my legs in towards each other. I noticed it about a month ago and practice it every night while in the shower. It seems to be getting stronger. Also while do this I actually can feel the muscles in my legs tightening and contracting. This sensation b is relatively new. I noticed recently that I have been getting some good finger movement. This probably do to all the hand writing I have been having to do with in my college class. So, some real good positive stuff going on. On the negative side lets tall UTI's. I have been living with one for the past two months. I have taken every antibiotic you can think of, and two weeks ago was the sickest I have been since my accident. It has been a real battle and really am sick and tired of feeling like crap all the time. We are planning another trip back to India for the middle of February. We feel like the progress has been good and that this treatment gives me the best chance for recovery. That's it for now. As always I will try to be more prompt with the updates. Talk to you soon.
Thursday, August 27, 2009
Good Procedure-Great Procedure
My next procedure was the following Monday. This would be a double procedure. I would be getting a lumbar puncture and at the same time they would be inserting another epidural catheter for three days. This is obviously the most serious of all the procedures. The lumbar puncture is where they go directly into your spinal cord. Patients usually have the most problems with procedure. Problems meaning that sometimes bad headaches or problems with high blood pressure occur. The procedure went very well as always. He gave me the lumbar puncture and than the catheter was inserted. Once I was back in my is where I started to have some difficulties. I started sweating pretty heavy in the face and body started getting very warm. I started getting anxious and this just made matters worse. They came in and checked my blood pressure. It had rose to 140 over 110. This is what was causing the sweating and the body temperature increase. We started getting a little nervous until doctor Ashish came in and described how this was very normal and not to worry. It was very reassuring to my father and I seeing how calm doctor Ashish was. He gave me an injection for my anxiety and ten minutes later I was napping. I woke up and felt a ton better. The excitement came on Wednesday morning when doctor Ashish gave me my last dose of stem cells. The sensation I started receiving five minutes after my injection was incredible. It started as a light tingling sensation in my lower back. The sensation made it's way down both of my legs into my toes. By the time it had reached my toes the tingling sensation had turned into an strong electric current feeling. This is all great , but I have experienced this before. The real cool part was still to come. The tingling sensation than worked it's way up my back, into my shoulders, and down both my arms into my fingers. This I have never experienced. What's so great about this is that it means the stem cells stimulated nerves which reach throughout my whole body. A connection has been made, or nerves repaired to be able to send that kind of a signal. The really cool thing is that the sensation lasted for about forty-five minutes. The longest it's ever lasted is about ten minutes. This kind of sensation is exactly what the doctors are striving for. My reaction to the procedure had made every body's day. This kind of outcome is what you would call "best case scenario." There is still a lot more to tell but I will leave you at that.
Saturday, August 15, 2009
Steady Progress
It was kind of an interesting week we had. I was supposed to go over for a procedure on Monday morning. Well, they ran a few tests early that morning, blood work and urine, and of course i had a urinary track infection. This is something I am always battling due to the catheter I have. So, in order to speed up the process of eliminating the infection it was decided that changing my cath would be a good idea. Well, to make a long story short, there ended up being a few technical difficulties. A lot of blood started showing up in my urine. The doctors here at the clinic got the bleeding to stop. It was then that they decided that it would probably be a good idea that I be taken to a hospital and kept overnight for observation. An ambulance was called and i was transported to Max Healthcare hospital. I stayed there over night having no other issues. The next afternoon we had another ambulance take me to the guatam nagar hospital where i would be receiving my procedure starting on Wednesday.
So, Wednesday afternoon I was taken into the operating theatre to receive my EC procedure. Just a couple days being schedule but no worries. When you have problems you have to deal with them and put them behind you. The EC procedure (epidural catheter) went very well as usual. Dr. Ashish is very steady and very precise. The catheter is inserted around the eleventh thoracic vertebrae and is ran up the epidural space stopping near the fifth or sixth thoracic vertebrae. Once inserted it is time to flood the are with millions of stem cells. I received to injections on Wednesday, two on Thursday, and a double dosage in the a.m. on Friday. I was very pleased on Wednesday when i received my first dosage of cells. If you can recall from my last trip every time i received an injection of cells I would get a real heavy and tight feeling in my stomach. Well, this time the sensation worked it's way down lower into my groin region, butt, and legs. My overall sensation has improved, mostly from the waist down. I am also happy to report that I am able to push the urine from my bladder on my own. Now, all I have to do is train the other muscle that gives you the ability to hold urine in and I am catheter free. How wonderful would that be. I a scheduled to receive another procedure on Wednesday so I will be in touch. Lots of love to my family and friends. See you all soon.