Quick update from kam

[Guest guest]

Hi everybody.I wanted to give you a quick update on how I am feeling and pose a few questions. I emailed Martha a couple of days ago and posed a few questions to her and thought it would be helpful to get multiple perspectives. Also, she mentioned that a lot that I said took her back to her recovery period, so I thought there might be some points of interest to the contemplators.First of all, if you do email me or address a post to me and I don't respond, please note that my short-term memory has practically disappeared! I will think of all these great things to do to occupy my time and then, at the end of the day, I sit there wondering why I am just recalling them and wondering what I've done all day! Perhaps I should tie paper and a pen around my neck... I do hope this is directly related to pain management and turns out to be temporary. Otherwise, things really are going well as far as recovery and decreased pain. I am able to sit for longer periods of time, which is nice. I am still sleeping an awful lot, but our weather has been the kookiest ever and seems to have awakened my allergies, which could be contributing to my sleepiness. We, in the middle of Oklahoma, have been bouncing between the 30s and the 80s (no joke) and have negative precipitation for the month (I think that means it has been extremely windy).In case anyone is interested, Occupational Therapy recommended I get a rolling cart the same height as our counter tops to move things around the kitchen. We found one at Lowe's for $40 with the wheels, which are bigger than the ones in this photo - http://www.lowes.com/lowes/lkn?action=productDetail & productId=116519-31158-6056-53 & lpage=noneIt has helped tremendously! I can load it up and move things (like laundry or paperwork I am attempting to organize) from room to room. It has made me feel so much more independent! I still really want that stacked washer and dryer, but for now, I just wait for Adam to move stuff out of the dryer so I can toss the wet stuff in...small sacrifice, really.As for pain, I am down to one hydrocodone at night and back on Ultram during the day. I have this fear that the pain meds aren't going to work very well after my next surgery since I've been on them for so long and since they aren't doing very much for me now anyway, I figure I might as well be taking the Ultram.I've come to grips with the fact that I'm destined to have a duck tail rather than a backwaist. My torso is ever-so-slightly longer, which is nice (except my pants are too short, which I totally wasn't expecting!). I've lost about 10 pounds, too, so you'd think my pants would be longer! All in all, I think I am grateful for the broomstick, which allowed me to be revised without osteotomies. We went to the mall to walk tonight and I tried on some pants and was pleased to realize this was possible without any assistance. The only help I needed was to get my shoes back on when I was done. This may sound funny to some of you, but I suspect those of you who have gone through this understand the significance of what I achieved!So, here are my burning questions for those of you that are post-revision... When did your bend restriction get lifted? What kinds of things were permitted first? What should I expect with this anterior surgery? How is it different than the posterior? (If any of you had your surgeries staged closer to a month apart, I would certainly love to hear your perspective.) Did you find any clever storage ideas up high so that you could put things away without assistance? I am so anxious to know when I can do a few things again and I am sort of anxious to get back to work where at least I can do things and feel productive! There are still all of these boxes around our house (we've been getting rid of a lot of furniture and stuff we don't really want or need) and I am not able to find homes for the stuff in them since I can't bend. I am completely stunned at how many things live in very low storage spots in our house. I had no idea! I would recommend to someone planning for revision surgery to take note of every time they bend over to get something out or put something away and consider finding a new home for it. If I had done this before I went to the hospital, I would've realized just how much stuff is stored low and wouldn't have to add to Adam's "to do" list to have things moved around. Sorry about the tangent. Solutions greatly appreciated!kam