[johnb]

That's funny that you mention the sedation. The lady who did the majority of mine didn't use sedation and I didn't know it was an option. 6 weeks into my dynesys surgery was when the bilateral nerve pain/burning and weakness started and I elected to see if an injection might calm things down. Due to the hardware, my PM said it would have to be done caudally so I'm glad sedation was an option. I'm glad I wasn't awake for that.

When I was young (4 to 5), I had a blood disorder, lymphoblastic leukemia, which required a lot of needle sticking so I guess I just became used to needles on a weekly basis. Various professionals over the years always remarked on how calm I've been with various procedures. In fact, the fellow that gave me the discogram remarked that I had the highest pain tolerance that he'd ever seen. I'm not sure about that but my mom did refuse pain medication at the hospital when she fractured her ankle (the nurses thought she was crazy) so it could be a family thing. The discogram occured after my IDET so perhaps it did seal some things up. I need to get my full medical record to look at it for myself. Point being is that my L5/S1 was not concordant for pain and it looks sick on the MRI for sure. L4/L5 was somewhat concordant but not awful so who knows really, I can only speculate. Can a disc be sick looking and not be painful? It most certainly can.

The blood disorder went into remission on its on and my pediatrician just said it was a one of those things that some would call a miracle.

John