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Life Afterward Spinal Fusion Surgery:

A Month-By-Month Breakdown of My Spinal Fusion Recovery

I go a lot of messages from people who've had spinal fusion surgery. Many are in the get-go few months of their recovery. Most inquire some variation of the question, "is my recovery normal?"

"I'm half-dozen weeks post-op and tire afterward xv minutes of walking. Is that normal?"

"I'1000 12 weeks postal service-op and my surgeon lifted all of my restrictions already. Is that normal?"

"I'm 4 months post-op and I'm still exhausted all the time. Is that normal?"

The answer in my head is always the same: "I have no thought."

Because honestly, I don't even know if my own surgery recovery was/is normal. Was it quicker or slower than average? Did I have more or less hurting than normal? Did I have hurting meds for too long? Or for not long plenty?

The answer to all of the above is aye. Because there is no normal. Each ane of us will experience spinal fusion surgery differently.

"Promise is not about proving anything. It'due south about choosing to believe this one thing, that honey is bigger than any grim, bleak shit anyone can throw at us." – Anne Lamott

I totally empathize the demand to compare notes though. I do information technology too. What choice exercise we have? In that location's no guidebook with an estimated timeline for your recovery – a "What to Expect When Your Bones are Fusing," if you will. And fifty-fifty if you have the most attentive & compassionate surgical squad in the world, they don't want y'all calling their part every day with questions about weird symptoms or your poop. Neither does your pharmacist or your concrete therapist.

We all just want some sort of benchmark – something to reassure is that nosotros are, in fact, normal. And more importantly, that things will become better.

I don't know if I'm normal or non, but as always I'1000 happy to share my experience with you. I'll break it down for you equally much equally I can, to the best of my recollection (some of it is a piffling hazy). And then allow's compare notes. Share your own experience for others who might need to hear it. (Annotation: I'm including some of my web log and Instagram posts from those beginning few months to help me paint a clearer flick for you.)

What to Wait After Spinal Fusion Surgery

Recovery from Spinal Surgery: Week i

My surgery was on a Th forenoon. I spent two nights in the hospital. I had some visitors and my hubby was with me the whole time, simply I think mostly I just slept a lot.

I was sent habitation with a common cold therapy automobile and prescriptions for Robaxin and Oxycodone. My insurance company provided a walker, and we borrowed a shower chair (an absolute essential for at-home recovery).

"oh, my darling, information technology's true. Beautiful things have dents and scratches too." – @writtenbyhim

On the way home from the hospital, we stopped at the pharmacy to selection up my prescriptions. I wasn't able to walk, then Vic pushed me in a wheelchair. When we got home, I somehow managed to walk through the front door, hobble up the stairs, and boost myself into bed, where I would stay for most of the side by side ten days.

I only got out of bed to use the bathroom, take a shower, or when my physical therapist made me. Getting in and out of bed was brutal. I was in a lot of pain. Way more than I expected. I spent near of that beginning week sleeping and counting the minutes until my side by side dose of hurting meds.

Calendar week 1 at a Glance:

I could get to and from the bathroom myself with the aid of my walker.
I needed help with just about everything else, including getting in and out of the shower and dressing myself.
The only exercise I got was in-home concrete therapy twice a week.

Recovery from Spinal Surgery: Week 2

During the kickoff two weeks, I had terrible, scary nervus pain in my left leg. This was especially frightening because my pre-op hurting was well-nigh entirely in my right leg and hip. Just my surgeon reassured me with some statistics (that he probably made up, now that I think about information technology) about leg pain beingness common after a spinal fusion.

I relied less on the walker, but I notwithstanding spent most of my time in bed, only occasionally getting up to shuffle effectually my chamber.

Calendar week two at a Glance:

I could walk effectually the house without a walker.
I could walk up & down the stairs.
I was able to shave my legs.
I was sleeping fairly well at nighttime, unremarkably merely waking when I needed pain meds.

I wrote this blog post at day thirteen of my spinal fusion recovery – it goes into greater detail nearly my experience.

Recovery from Spinal Surgery: Week 3

The nerve pain wasn't gone by calendar week 3, simply it was more manageable. That'south when I really started to find the discomfort in my back. Not hurting, exactly. More like I had a brick strapped to my lower dorsum. In a way, this was scarier than the leg pain – I was convinced that this was my hardware poking through my pare and that my back would experience this way forever. (Spoiler: it didn't.)

I had my showtime post-surgery outing – dinner at The Loop with my husband.

I also had my commencement follow-upwards visit with my surgeon during week 3, and I had my kickoff set of mail-op x-rays. Vic and I were stunned to see the size of the screws in my back.

My incision site was cherry-red and itchy, but information technology turned out to be an allergic reaction to the bandage adhesive. I was healing well and moving effectually the business firm with more ease, but I connected to spend the majority of fourth dimension in bed – largely because lying on my back with my legs propped up on pillows was the most comfortable position for me to exist in. Sitting upright was uncomfortable, and I could just represent curt periods at a fourth dimension.

This week was also my last week of total-time recovery. Vic was back at piece of work, merely my kids were at overnight camp. I didn't have much to do besides resting and healing.

Week 3 at a Glance:

I no longer needed the walker. I walked slowly, but I was steady on my anxiety.
I was able to do small-scale household tasks, similar folding laundry and making a grilled cheese sandwich.
I was still taking pain meds throughout the twenty-four hours but had started weaning myself off the Oxycodone.
I was able to tolerate short car rides.

Recovery from Spinal Surgery: Week 4

By week 4, I was officially back on full-time Mom Duty, at least during the 24-hour interval. I still needed Vic to do a lot around the business firm – cooking dinner, bath fourth dimension, making our morning coffee. He also took over the grocery shopping, which he continued to do up until adequately recently. (Fifty-fifty now, it can still exist hard for me to carry the groceries and be on my feet for that long. Plus I merely like having him do it. Not gonna prevarication.)

I was able to drive short distances, which also meant that I was able to go without pain meds during the day.

By the end of the day, I was usually in a fair amount of pain, which meant pain medication and dorsum to bed with ice on my dorsum. I don't think if I was nonetheless having leg pain at this point, simply if I was it must non accept been too bad. Virtually of the hurting was in my dorsum at the fusion site. Some of the swelling had subsided, but the feeling of having a brick in my back wasn't completely gone.

And speaking of bed – yes, that's where I was all the same spending a lot of my time. We moved a TV into the sleeping room, and then the girls spent a lot of fourth dimension laying with me and watching Netflix. Nosotros don't commonly accept televisions in any of our bedrooms, so this was a care for for them. And they also enjoyed the temporary lift of the "no eating in bed" rule. After spending much of the past few weeks solitary, I enjoyed their company very much.

Week 4 at a Glance:

I was able to drive for short distances.
I was mostly weaned off of daytime pain meds, but I withal took them in the evenings and before bed.
I didn't do whatsoever intentional practice – just relied on caring for the kids and walking upwards & down the stairs 100 times a day to go along active.
I tired very easily and napped daily.

Recovery from Spinal Surgery: Weeks 5-6

Past weeks 5 and half-dozen, I started feeling a little anxious/guilty about the wearisome pace of my recovery. I'd expected to feel nearly recovered past and so, which wasn't fifty-fifty remotely the case. I was still ho-hum and stiff and tired all the time. I was back on my feet, though. Life was normal-ish. I took the kids to the pool and out on piddling errands, and I was fifty-fifty brave plenty to have Sophia (just the ii of us) to the beach for a few hours.

At my 6 week follow-upwards visit, my surgeon cleared me to practice very gentle yoga, but I didn't feel at all set. I was very worried about re-injuring myself. I walked when I could, but I nonetheless wasn't doing whatsoever real exercise, including my physical therapy exercises (I wish I'd been more diligent virtually them).

Weeks v-6 at a Glance:

My pain was manageable; near of the time I felt stiffness and/or discomfort, rather than actual pain.
I was only taking hurting medication at night, so my caput was clearer.
Still tired, still taking daily naps.

Recovery from Spinal Surgery: Weeks 7-8

During week 7, I went on my showtime mail-op route trip for my grandma'due south 95th birthday party. It was about a 4 hour bulldoze, and while it wasn't the most comfortable feel of my life, it wasn't likewise bad.

I pushed myself a fiddling too hard on this trip though, and I concluded up with some weird symptoms – muscle spasms, headache, etc. And, of course, I was wearied like e'er.

I wrote a web log mail service describing life at viii weeks afterward spine surgery, and it describes things much better than I could at present. Information technology's chosen, fittingly, "Not Normal Is the New Normal."

Recovery from Spinal Surgery: Weeks 9-12

I'll just hit the highlights hither.

Week ix: I finally started practicing some very gentle yoga and stretching.

Calendar week 10: I went kayaking with my family for the beginning time e'er, and I didn't experience whatsoever pain!

Week xi: The kids went back to school, and I took this moving picture in my driveway. (I don't advise jumping at 11 weeks post-op – it hurt afterwards.)

Week 12: I started a regular walking routine, commonly solo morning embankment walks, but sometimes with a friend.

Life After Spinal Fusion: iii Months

I drove myself to my iii month follow-up appointment with my surgeon. I had x-rays taken, and he said that everything looked nifty. I asked if he could see whatsoever evidence of bone growth, and he told me that information technology was as well before long for information technology to show up on an ten-ray. He lifted all of my restrictions – not just BLT (bend, lift, twist), but ALL of them – he essentially said that I could do any I wanted, equally long it didn't hurt. The only things he specifically told me to avoid were sit-ups, crunches, and button-ups. Everything else was fair game.

He too said that I was free to get-go running and yoga again, but that I should avoid whatever activity that acquired pain. He stressed that at that place was no benefit for me to "push through the hurting," as pain (not muscle strain or discomfort) was an indication that something was non correct.

And so he released me from his care, which I was not expecting at all. No half dozen month follow-up, no annual cheque-ups – only adept luck, and call us if you accept any problems.

Life After Spinal Fusion: four Months

Early in my 4th month of recovery, we took a family unit vacation to Washington, D.C. Information technology involved a lot of walking, and I came dorsum to the hotel and crashed every twenty-four hours around five:00 p.m. But other than that, the trip was a peachy success.

In the start year after my surgery, we also visited Disney World (vii months post-op), Colorado (9 months post-op), and New York (12 months mail-op). I also took a solo trip to Colorado at eleven months post-op.

At the 4 calendar month mark, I was feeling relatively normal – even so a fleck slower and stiffer than usual, and certainly not dorsum to my pre-injury level of physical activity, only definitely a lot more like myself. The merely major symptom that I was nevertheless experiencing at that time was exhaustion. Abiding, almost oppressive burnout. I still required daily naps in order to make information technology to bedtime. But on the vivid side, I ordinarily only need to sleep for an hr or and so, whereas I was napping for 2-3 hours at a fourth dimension in previous months.

By this fourth dimension, I'd stopped taking pain meds almost entirely. I occasionally needed a pill at bedtime when I'd overdone it during the day, but that was it.

Life After Spinal Fusion: 5 Months

This web log post describes pretty thoroughly what my life was like at 5 months after my spine surgery.

Life After Spinal Fusion: Your Plow!

In that location you lot have it – my beginning 5 month of recovery in a nutshell. If you lot desire to know more details about any phase of recovery, or if you have whatsoever questions (full general, specific, personal, weird, whatever) delight ask me! I want to help y'all as much every bit I can. Besides – if you've had spinal fusion surgery, delight chime in here. I don't want this to exist just about my experience. I want to hear yours also, and then do others, trust me.

For more recent updates on my post-op life, read these posts:

1 Twelvemonth Postal service-Op: Spinal Fusion Update: One Year Later (A Letter of the alphabet to Myself)

Iii Years Mail service-Op: Life After Spinal Fusion: I Went Skiing at 3 Years Mail-Op!

Five Years Mail-Op: Five Years Later My Spinal Fusion: An Update