Last Wed...one week ago tomorrow I had the RFA thing done on my lumbar spine.
This procedure for those who don't know what I am talking about.
https://mayfieldclinic.com/pe-rf_ablation.htm
https://www.webmd.com/arthritis/radiofr ... ablation#1
There's a lot of history that goes along with my situation that I won't go into right now but the short version is just a really screwed up lower back and pelvis stemming primarily from a bad auto accident injury some years back where a bunch of stuff got crushed, broken and and in general f....d up. It is what it is.
The spine became unstable...and I now also have scoliosis added in besides the arthritis crap.
Couple of years ago had cortisone injections in the SI joints...they helped a lot for about 6 to 8 months....then last summer had them repeated and no relief at all...so we talked about RFA. Long road to get to this point.
Can't take NSAIDs due to GI issues....and they don't really help anyway.
Even the good stuff...opiates...doesn't really do much in terms of pain relief...takes the edge off sometimes and I can't take too much of it because it causes nausea and vomiting. I wouldn't make a good drug addict.
I don't handle nausea well at all. Besides opiates don't get rid of the cause of the pain...they just make you not care that you hurt. So what they did last Wed was a local lidocaine for needle placement...burning of the sensory nerves in 8 facets from L2 down to S1...4 on each side....then they inject a little cortisone to help with inflammation secondary to the trauma of the procedure.
They tell you not to expect much for up to 6 weeks or so because everyone heals differently and responds differently.
I couldn't have it done in the actual SI joint because that is now considered an experimental procedure (wasn't always the case) and unfortunately the SI joints are probably a major factor in my pain issues. I don't have much in the way of SI joints due to all the trauma that happened to the pelvis some years ago....essentially crushed the pelvis and dislocated the joints and broke my back in the process.
It's too soon to expect much and I was told to expect things to get worse before it got better and yesterday it did...big time get worse.
The cortisone finally wore off.
I could tell it was gone because I was no longer hungry as a horse no matter how much I ate.Bad way to be when on a diet.
I think it was wearing off by Sunday....was having increased pain in the left lumbar area where all the scoliosis is at its worst.
By yesterday I could barely walk...it was take a step...have pain...rest till the pain subsided and then take another step...rest, etc.
Not a good day at all.
And I have been a good girl...was told to take it easy and under no circumstances go doing stuff I shouldn't be doing just because I maybe felt a little better because I was feeling better because of the cortisone and it would wear off...and it did.
I now just need to give it time (hard for me since patience is not one of my virtues) and take care of myself.
Yesterday's pain is MUCH reduced today...so that's a plus. I can manage it well enough at this level.
It's just too soon to really know what the final result will be....I was told don't even think about evaluating much until 2 weeks post procedure and then take it with a grain of salt.
One of the reasons I elected to have this procedure...my sleep is crap because of the pain. Numerous awakenings and arousals from the pain...and when I don't sleep good I don't feel good which in turn makes it even harder to manage the pain. Nasty cycle.
One plus I have noticed so far....normally I can't just lay in bed for very long and try to get more sleep when I know I haven't had enough sleep. My back would hurt like hell...felt like I was laying on a bed of nails.
The bed of nails is gone at least for right now. I can now at least lay down and sleep in any position without the bed of nails being present. That alone is a big plus and gives me a reason to be optimistic that I am going to get some relief from my issues.
I know I won't be pain free...just not going to happen but if I can reduce the level of pain and start doing stuff that I need and want to do and sleep better...then I can count that as a win.
Chronic pain is fatiguing...no matter what level of pain a person has. You just get so tired of hurting that you have zero energy to do anything and actually when we have arthritis type of issues we need to do stuff or the arthritis just gets worse. Another nasty cycle.
Then it screws up your sleep and you add another level to the fatigue from poor sleep quality.
I used to get 7 to 8 hours of decent enough sleep...now I am doing good to get 5 hours and that's simply not enough especially when I have a gazillion pain related arousals in those 5 hours. Last night I managed to get about 6 hours....better than 5 hours and I haven't had a chance to look at the flow rate to evaluate arousals. The AHI I know will be low and I don't really watch it....I watch the flow rate and look for arousal breathing to evaluate my overall sleep quality. Arousals are a killer in terms of my sleep quality...even if I got 10 hours of sleep it doesn't mean I will feel better until I get the arousal numbers down to a more manageable level.
All goes back to what I have said for years...good numbers don't mean squat if your sleep quality is in the toilet because of arousals from any reason. Mine happen to be from pain but people can have arousals from anything and they just screw with sleep quality and we have to have good sleep quality for the restorative powers of sleep to work their magic.
We know we can't do much about the SI joint stuff...we are just hoping that the RFA will help reduce the lumbar issues so that the SI issues are more manageable and not so debilitating. Hoping that breaking the circuit with the nerve will help.
. And that you watch your step.