Aimee,
I always ask for a copy of my report and for a copy of films or CD of films.
This way I have a copy for personal records and to take to whichever specialist I might choose to utilize for a consultation.
As Mark stated, it sounds as though you will progress to surgery. I cannot stress the importance of educating yourself quickly as to what options might be available to you regarding surgery because your long term outcome may likely depend on the information you obtain and the surgeon who performs your surgery, what type of surgical procedure you will have, how your body responds to the surgery and of course in terms of who performs your surgery, the knowledge and skill of the surgeon and what is available to him/her in terms of best decision making for your particular case.
I am someone who injured myself orginally at age 28 and have lived with pain and failed results from a surgery back in '92. While I have been a candidate for more surgery, because of the degree of failure of the surgery in '92 I have been scared to have more surgery. Thus prolonging my problems and most likely worsening my own spinal situation.
However I have sought enough opinions that I felt good about that much whenever I should decide to proceed with a 3rd surgery.
You are young. Your outcome may well depend on your informed decision makng. Please start now to educate yourself. Start with getting a copy of your reports to take to a 2nd surgical opinion.
If this emergent and you must have surgery immediately because of neurodefecits progressing rapidly then you likely have to take care of business and have surgery right away. I'm not sure what the Neurosurgeon told you so don't want to encourage you to prolong things if surgery is considered urgent or emergent. If not, you've likely time to educate yourself to options a bit and get a few more surgical opinions.
check out
www.chirogeek.com to read about the different topics. There you can read about protrusion vs bulge, vs. herniation and so forth.
Get started now! take care ~Maria