Stimulating Ironman

Legendary Paddle Lead Destroyer

I graduated from high school near the top of my class and was one of the best athletes in my school.  I was awarded the “Best All-Around Female Student” my Senior Year.  I was voted “Most Likely to Succeed” by my peers for the Homecoming Dance, my first and only superlative win.  I had a stellar academic career at one of the most selective and demanding liberal arts schools in the country.  I gradated from the United States Army Flight School and became qualified in the OH 58D “Kiowa Warrior.”  I’ve completed 4 triathlons and a half marathon and I was rated the #1 Captain out of 15 during my stint in Iraq.  I have had many accomplishments in my life thus far, but my proudest moment occurred Friday, January 30th around 1339 in the afternoon.  On Friday afternoon, my wonderful neurosurgeon, Dr. Joe Bernard of Carolina Neurosurgery and Spine Associates cut into a couple of thoracic levels of my back and discovered a hard, rubbery plastic paddle lead, one that is supposed to be indestructible, fractured down the middle.  It had completely separated from its electrical contacts and the wire.  My neurosurgeon and neither of my Boston Scientific reps had ever seen that happen.  I’ve polled several other experienced employees at Boston Scientific Neuromodulation and they had never heard of that happening.  How cool is that?  There is no actual proof that my high activity level damaged the paddle lead like this, but I am one of the most active patients with this device and easily could have pulled it during my recent adventures.  Paddle leads are literally tied onto vertebrae, solidly in place.  Whatever I did was something that I should never do again.  Wish I knew what it was. . .

I am proud of this feat not only because I am the only one to have done it but it is proof that I haven’t let pain or naysayers stop me from living my life the way I want.  I’ve become active and thus happy again because of this device.  Not having it for a month while they figured out what to do with it was excruciating.  Pain is an interesting phenomenon.  If the brain becomes used to feeling it, it will never forget it.  Without the stimulator, that nerve pain slowly crept up to unbearable levels.  The week before I started my new job, the pain was so bad that it would make me queasy and throw up.  I couldn’t even pee right, all because the pain was severe.  You know what I did?  I sucked it up, downed some Nauzene and drove on.  If I relegated myself to the couch all I would really have done was focus on the pain and wallow in my misery.  I’ve learned from experience that this type of attitude does not help pain.  In fact, it makes me miserable and makes me very miserable to be around.  My surgeon scheduled me very quickly for the stimulator revision so only a few days after the conference I went in for my 4th back surgery in about 2 years.  We are old pros a this.  I spent one night in the hospital for observation, and that whole experience is for another blog entry.  Suffice it to say that I will birth my children and have any major procedure at CMC any day of the week.  I had the weekend to recover from the surgery and it only took a couple of days to start feeling normal again.  I don’t even really have incision pain, despite two incisions: one in the thoracic region and the other on my left upper butt cheek.  I worked on strengthening both areas before the surgery and I think that helped with my recovery.  I was afraid the recovery would be similar to the first, which was quite miserable.  I had muscle spasms and couldn’t sit normally in a chair for a couple of weeks.  I couldn’t stand up for more than 10 minutes at a time due to pain and tired very easily.  This recovery has been so easy that I forgot I even had the surgery.  I am supposed to be taking it real easy so the new paddle lead scars in like it is supposed to and stay put.  I’m not supposed to lift my arms over my head (very tough for me) and I’m supposed to stay pretty sedentary (also tough for me).  I can  walk for exercise but that is about it (blah).  Thus far I have just thrown myself into my work, which I am immensely enjoying.

My next step in the process is to decide which activities I will continue and which ones I wil keep.  Kathy and my Mom vote for knitting, crocheting, scrapbooking and reading.  Joanne votes for walking, hiking, yoga and lifting very ight weights.  Dad recommends treadmill walking and hiking the Appalachian trail.  These are all fine activities that I will consider, but I need something a little more adventurous.

Here are the activities that I hate to lose but have to stop in order to avoid having a surgery every year:

Triathlon

Snowboarding (I’m not mentally ready to give that one up yet)

trampoline jumping

cliff diving

Strongman competition

Pull-Ups

Tae Kwon Do

Boxing

Rowing

Heavy weight lifting

WWE Wrestling

American Gladiator competition

Laundry

Any Cleaning of the house

Vacuuming

Here are a few ideas that I have that are a nice meeting in the middle:

Snowboarding only green and easy blue runs, no tricks

Swimming, swimming, swimming

Pilates and Yoga

Indoor rock climbing

whitewater kayaking

racewalking

Earning my plate on the wall at The Flying Saucer

Creating a butt-shaped dent in the couch from watching Tru TV marathons

knitting/cross stitching

baking

Gardening

Tap Dancing

Muay Thai martial arts

Okay, now it is time for audience participation.  If you are still awake after reading this long dialogue, suggest some new activities for me.  As much as I like my Pain Management doctor, Neurosurgeon, the stellar care at CMC and getting Blue Cross bills in the mail, I don’t want to have procedure after procedure.  I wake up everyday looking forward to my job; I am living a life with much less pain, no painkillers and my social calendar is usually full.  I have a good life and enough scars in my back to last a lifetime.  My name is Darisse.  I am an adventure and exercise addict.  God grant me the courage to change the things I can!

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