Limbo

Now I am waiting.  I would say that my back feels at about 80 percent.  I have twinges with certain movements.  It is hard to know what will hurt or what won’t.  But main job now is to wait and let it heal.  Still now bending over, no lifting over 10 pounds.  No. No. No.  No running, no biking, no motorcycle riding.  There are things I am afraid to ask permission to do, like motorcycle riding.  But common sense tells me its a no-no.

I am not intending to complain here, although maybe I have.  I am living in limbo, waiting three more weeks to my final pass. I can hardly believe that after those three weeks are up, I will be free to run or ride my bike.  Surely I must add these things back in gradually.  Again I have been afraid to ask.

Now that I have written all of this I realize what is really on my mind…my insurance is denying my claims, saying this is a pre-existing condition.  Ah-insurance companies.  I have calls to make this week.  I don’t know how hard it will be to sort this out, or even if I will be able to sort it out.  I dread it and it leaves me with a sick feeling in my stomach.  Paper work is not my forte and I see paper work in my future, if I am to get through this stage.  I suspect getting my costs covered will prove much harder than recovering from the surgery and potentially more painful than a blown disc.  Of course they are completely different pains and hardly comparable.

Health insurance, ugh.  You spend all that money and then they aren’t there when you need them.

 

Steroids Work–at least for now…

Yesterday, I had my follow-up appointment with my neurosurgeon.  A little background first though.  I started taking the steroid pack on Friday, by Saturday, I felt invincible–no pain.  By Sunday night I had a couple twinges again.  Yesterday a couple more, and today a little more.  I need to clarify that I am still well below the pain level that I felt last week and that pain was only intermittent whereas pre-surgery pain was severe and constant.

The Docs listened to all this and judged that the nerve is inflamed and hopefully the steroids will do there thing.  They were also very clear that if the pain worsened I should call them.  An MRI would be the next step.  He said they didn’t want to subject me to another MRI until they gave the steroids a chance to work.  Since I am not claustrophobic, I don’t think an MRI is much to be subjected to.  As far as I know they are harmless.  They cause know pain and don’t even take that long.  There is no recovery period.  What exactly would I be subjected to?  I think it is the insurance company that would be subjected to payment.

Don’t get me wrong, i am not opposed to saving some money and waiting and seeing, but I’d rather be up front about it.

That having been said, I do still trust my doctors.  Hmm, is that because the deserve it or because of some need to believe that these people who suddenly have this prominent and powerful role in my life are trustworthy?

I honestly can’t say.

In the meantime, I do my best to follow the doctors’ directions, which means not bending over and not lifting anything over 10 pounds.  I haven’t weighed the video equipment yet, so I am not knowingly breaking the rule by carrying it around, but between you and me–it probably weighs more than the allowable amount.

Regardless, working on everything is ten times easier and I find myself counting the hours less as I work on projects.  So hooray for back surgery even if the relief is temporary.

 

Disappointment: Steroids

The magic is over.

Right after my surgery I was pain free but no longer.  I have pain in my leg when walking and after standing up from a sitting position.

I am still better off than I was, but it is getting worse everyday.  By the time I had my surgery I was in constant pain, but months before I was only in pain when I did certain things, like now.  So I’m worried that I am headed down the same path.

The pain with walking started on Monday and it took me until Thursday to get up the gumption to call the doctor.  They confirmed what I had expected.  The pain could be caused by one of two things.  Either more disc material has leaked out and is pushing on my nerve again or the nerve is simply inflamed from all the trauma.

The answer is to take steroids, a powerful anti-inflammatory.  An MRI would show the cause or lack of cause, but my guess is it is too expensive.  An MRI runs in the neighborhood of $1000, while the steroids cost $10.  I guess the steroids are harmless enough that it’s okay to take them even if the problem won’t be fixed by them.  If I have disc material pushing on the nerve, steroids won’t help.  I presume that an MRI would then be in order.  But that is only a guess, because I failed to ask the question that I was thinking when I was on the phone with the nurse.

I am, of course, worried that I may have to have surgery again.  But on the other hand, I now know that surgery isn’t terribly hard.  So I am resigned to continue living with the restrictions this puts on me.

I’m not excited about taking steroids, but is its only for seven days, so I don’t think there is much harm in it.  At least I hope not.  At this point I am trusting in my doctor.

I have heard that it is a common phenomenon for people to take a backseat to their health care and I find it interesting how I let my questions go and just do what they tell me.  There is something about the doctor patient relationship that makes it difficult to step back and ask all the questions or even remember them.

I also just don’t have that much time.  Even as I am writing this, I am getting ready to go work on Reporting story and my Missourian shift and when I was talking to the nurse yesterday I was driving to an interview.  Fortunately I had time to pull over and give the call my attention.  I don’t know how I would have talked, driven and navigated my directions through a strange town all at the same time.

I guess that sums it up.  I am probably lucky to be busy, because it means I don’t have time to do too much worrying.

 

The Night After

I made it.  I am laying here on the futon couch downnstairs because my Mom was worried about me crawling onto my mattress on the floor.  Truth is I feel pretty damn good and I think I could have done it.  The futon is perfectly comfortable (more so than most) so why bother with the crawling on the floor.

The first thing they asked me when I came out of surgery was how my leg felt.  I was both pleased and relieved to say that it didn’t hurt at all.  To top it off, I could barely even feel the incision in my back.   They gave me morphine anyway, then I felt really good.  Then they sent me home.  It wasn’t even 11:00 a.m.  I haven’t seen it yet but my incision is less than two inches long.  They said it will hardly leave a scar, but that is hard to believe.  I scare terribly.

Waking up seemed easy, after all that worry.  I was having a dream and then they were waking me up.  It must have been some dream because they said that I was moving enought to pull out my IV.  I dont’ remember that or them putting in a new one.

My Mom came with me.  Thank God for Mom’s.  I think we were the first one’s to the surgery check-in.  They took me back and told my Mom that she had to stay in the waiting area, until after I had my IV in.  Then everyone else started showing up.   Mom noticed that the nurse was  letting other visitors come back with the patients.  A little peeved Mom pointed this observation out and said she wanted to come back to see me.  That little lady can be quite assertive, especially when it comes to her children.  No matter that i am 36 years old..

After Mom came back it didn’t matter so much that I hadn’t taken my pain medicine that morning and that my leg hurt.  We did a crossword puzzle and made fun of my hospital gown, head covering, and socks with no slip on them.  I didn’t let her take my picture.  I had her fix my sock which was askew.  It has been really hard to put my socks on the last few months.  That should get better now, but I’m not  supposed to bend over.  I think I will be wearing slip-on sandals for awhile.  Not a bad choice considering the time of year.

What was the worst thing about the surgery?  There really isn’t much to complain about.  I have a wicked sore throat from the breathing tube they put down my throat.  I have gooey sticky betadine on my backside, and I can’t take a shower for three days. But these are fairly minimal– don’t you think.

The future looks bright right now.  I did take two Vicodin today, but that is all.  I had some leg pain after we ran a few errands.  That’s right, I was out running errands today, er yesterday.  I can see myself biking and running again.  Although I have to admit that skiing doesn’t appeal much to me at the moment.  I would hate to go through all of this again.  I’m not sure if the skiing did it, but I don’t want to test it out either.  Maybe I was just looking for an excuse to stop skiing.  Yeah maybe I was.

One thing I like about Missouri is that it feels so much less competitive here.  If I were still in Steamboat, and decided to quit skiing there would be no explaining it.  But here there are so many other options for me to focus on.  It seems odd that in this much more conservative place, my options would seem so open–but that is how it feels.  Steamboat has it’s own version of conservative or maybe it is just repressively radical.

I’m happy.  Happy to be here, pain free.

 

The Night Before

Surgery begins tomorrow promptly at 8:00 a.m..  That means I need to get there at 6:00 a.m.  Not my favorite time to get up in the morning, but that is the least of my worries.  The thought of anesthesia makes me nervous.  There is the concern of never waking up again, but I also know from experience that the anesthesia is one of the hardest parts of recovery after surgery.

First of all, you have to wake up, which is hard.  It’s not like waking up at 5:00 in the morning.  This kind of waking is like trying to crawl out from under an oppressively heavy blanket that just keeps going on and on.  Its is dark and hard to move or think or talk.

Then there is the process of getting the anesthesia out of your system.  It takes weeks I think.

Mostly, I think I have watched too many episodes of ER, and Grey’s Anatomy and I worry about complications.

The surgery should be simple though and not too long and really there is no reason to expect anything to go wrong.

I am trying to be proactive, focusing on the things they have given me to do in preparation for tomorrow.

I showered with antibacterial soap to knock down the bacterial count on my skin–hopefully minimizing the possibility of infection.

I had a good dinner at Sycamore–Thanks Mom!

Drinking lots of water.

But no food after midnight or I turn into a gremlin.  And, oh shoot, see I have already forgotten the rules about drinking water.

I think that’s it for pre-op.

Afterwards I am supposed to “ambulate” for 15 minutes twice a day after surgery.  The use of ambulate in the directions cracks me up.  Talk about using unnecessarily complicated language.  Seems like “walking” would have sufficed.

I can’t lift more than 10 pounds and I should bend my back.

Really not bad requirements considering they are operating on my spine.

Now I think all that is left is to get a good night’s sleep and I have Vicodin to help with that.  So I must be set.
Now I am off to sleep in my freshly washed sheets, with a low bacterial count.

 

To Vicodin or Not to Vicodin

So I’m on Vicodin.  There are lots of interesting things about using Vicodin.  First the boring but important things…it treats pain, and contains acetaminophen (Tylenol) and hydrocodone (a narcotic).  Like many drugs they don’t know exactly how it works, for instance the acetaminophen makes the hydrocodone work better, but they don’t know why.

Now some of the maybe more interesting things…

I am taking a narcotic every three hours and I am still allowed to drive!  Although there are frequent reminders that I “be careful” if I drive.  Really, “be careful?”  Isn’t one of the problems that maybe it clouds your judgement and reaction time which actually means that I would be less capable of “being careful?”  In the interest of full disclosure, I have tried to avoid driving, but I have done driven.

It does say that I should avoid alcohol while on the medication, which I have been doing.

There are lots of nifty potential side-effects like constipation (which hasn’t been a problem), headaches, nausea, and dry mouth.

Out of all of this the issue that gives me the most concern is that the drug is often habit forming.

When I had knee surgery as a teenager, I took one, maybe two of my pain killers.  Later when I threw my back out, I did the same thing with my pain killers and muscle relaxers.  I didn’t like the way they made me feel and the narcotics in particular made me paranoid.

For years I have wondered why doctors even prescribe potentially habit forming drugs.  It seems irresponsible.

But now I understand.  This time is different.  The release these drugs bring from what would otherwise be an ever-present and penetrating pain is hard to turn down.

The cost of the relief is peace of mind.

I am constantly worried, wondering if I am becoming an addict under physician supervision.  How will I know when I am no longer taking them for pain and I’m taking them for some other reason.  What will that reason be?  What will I be telling myself?  The one thing I have noticed is that whether I am in pain or not, it is hard to sleep without them.  Is that the first step?

Should the doctor have briefed me on these things?  Should I have asked?  I wonder if more up front education would help prevent addiction.  Maybe they could give me warning signs to look for.

I just googled vicodin addiction.  That was scary.  http://www.vicodin-addiction.com/ is a website produced by a treatment program.  Maybe it is in their interest to make it sound scarier than it is.  But they say that the Vicodin leads your brain to stop making its own endorphins.  Normally, endorphins make you feel good, but if the Vidodin is doing the trick by making you feel good, then your brain doesn’t need to keep making endorphins.  However when you quit there is a time period when you just wouldn’t have chemicals to make you feel good.  That is only for awhile of course, but still, I can see how it would be hard to quit.

At this point, all I can think to do is wait for my surgery, which is soon, and get off this stuff as soon as possible.

Until then, …I worry.

 

MRI = Miraculous Reader of your Insides

Back in January, after a month of skiing, I had a very sore right buttock.  I thought that meant that my posterior musculature had been strained and I waited for it to pass.  But I was wrong.

It took a few tries for the doctor and physical therapist to convince me that my problem was in my back.  Finally it was Rick Rother who demonstrated that I could make the pain go away by sitting up straight and using my stomach muscles to stabilize my spine.  Hallelujah!  I still couldn’t bend over or stretch my leg out too far in front of me, and sometimes I had to ask my boyfriend to put on my sock.

So I went to physical therapy one to two times a week and we worked on getting my flexibility back and strengthening my distressingly weak stomach muscles.  If my leg started to hurt while I sat in front of the computer at work, all I had to do was remind myself to sit up straight and the pain would drain away.

Then one weekend, I mowed the lawn.  This is the only thing I can think that did it to me.  That night I couldn’t sleep, my right leg pulsed with reverbrating pain.  Nothing helped.  I took 800 mg of Ibuprophen and tossed and turned.  That morning I made an appointment with the doctor.

My doctor scheduled an MRI, which stands for magnetic resonance imaging, but I think it deserves a more magical name.

Just a few days later, I was in a hospital gown laying inside a large tube listening to John Hiatt through a set of headphones, while the MRI machine clanged around me.

That was a Friday.  Late on Monday afternoon, I got a call from the nurse.  The MRI showed I had two bulging discs in my back and they were recommending that I see a neurosurgeon.

So I made another appointment.  A little over a week later I was in a hospital gown again.  This time they showed me pictures of my MRI results.

Wow, that’s why I hurt so bad…

spine 1

spine 2

In photo 1, we are looking at a section of my spine from the side.  I circled the bulging disc.  I think bulging is a bit of an understatement.  This is huge and it is pressing on the nerve, which is why my leg hurts.

In between each segment of vertebrae is a disc made of cartilage and filled with some sort of watery goo.  The disc cushions the movement of the vertebrae against each other.  In my case the ring of cartilage that holds the goo in has broken and the goo is squishing out and pushing on my nerve.

In the second photo, you can see just how badly the nerve is being restricted.  That white shape should be symetrical, but instead half of it is blocked by the disc.

The doctors could guess which disc had the problem based on where my pain was because each segment has its own set of nerves. In addition to pain I have decreased reflexes in my right leg.

The doctors are recommending surgery.  In this case, the pressure on the nerve won’t be relieved until the disc material is removed.  This is called a discectomy.  They don’t remove the entire disc, just the part that is where it shouldn’t be.

My surgery is June second and I will be blogging about the experience here.  Unfortunately there won’t be anymore groovy MRI’s to look at, but there will be plenty of other information about how MRI’s work, the spinal cord, the details of my surgery, and how I feel.  So stay tuned.

 

Key points for video editing

From the reading there were several highlights that I noticed:

• Set the scene with a wide shot and then go closer.  Our minds eye surveys the scene and then focuses on small details
• Try to have cut aways that are relevant to the material being discussed–because I a lot of my video before I knew any of this some of my cut aways may be generic–but I do have some relevant ones.
• I particularly found the outline format in the article on writing copy helpful.  I outlines the lead-in, the lede, the middle, the conclusion with details describing each section.  This really helps me understand how I can organize my information.
• I also don’t thing I have enough variation in my shots as far as wide, medium, and tight goes, but I do have some.
• I did well using a tri pod and not panning or zooming.
• I tried to change up point of view, but I probably don’t have enough of this.
• I know I don’t have enough action and this is due to a lack of people fishing and the fact that some of my footage didn’t tape because I was at the end of my tape and didn’t realize it.  Live and learn, right.
• There was a lot about multiple cameras and staging shots that isn’t relevant to us.  But I did like the idea of getting different shots of repeated actions.
• In one of my interviews I didn’t use the rule of thirds because I hadn’t learned it yet.
• I liked the part about editing being part selection, arrangement, timing, and presentation.  This makes sense to me, including all parts of production, especially what you choose to shoot in the first place.

 

Video analysis

http://www.sciencedaily.com/videos/2008/0807-pollution_killing_flowers_fragrance.htm

This story is about how pollution is affecting flower scent.

I like the b-roll and nat sound in the video.  In particular the shots to demonstrate pollution sources.  The narration seems effective and the sound bites are well placed.

I feel like there could be more information.  Exactly which pollutions are affecting the flower scents.  How much of a problem is this for bees.  Why should I care about bees anyway.  If its affecting flower scents is it affecting other scents.

I am very new to the news world and it is hard for me to see how this story would be different in print.  The video insinuates that car and powerplant pollution are responsible for the problem but doesn’t actually say that it is.  They just label it as general pollution.  In a print story it would have to be more cut and dry.  You would have to say that either it is just pollution in general or specifically emmissions from cars and powerplants.  There is no good way to give the visuals of pollution without refering to something specific.  In this particular case I think the ambiguity of pollution in this story is a weak spot.

 

Learning by example

I listened to the story about Yoking.

Listening to this story after I completed my project is probably not the order I was supposed to do it in, but I might have been able to glean so much more in this after the fact manner.  Besides this is just the beginning in terms of my production of audio stories, hopefully.

The first thing I noticed was the nat sound intro.  It might have been nice to have an intro that was a little more obviously a church.  That intro, just told me that it was some sort of gathering–I felt a little disoriented.  But throughout the rest of the piece he has really nice use of nat sound and a great variety of nat sound.

His transitions are seamless and the whole piece flows nicely.  His introductions or lead ins for sound bites were much less formal than I did mine, and I think they are much better that way.  He just says who someone is and gives some info about him or her and then lets the character speak.  I use more of a “here is what so and so had to say on that matter.”

His format was helpful to observe as well.  He introduces his first character right away and gets us interested in him.  Then he gives us facts then back to the character, some more facts, back to the character, then a new character, some more facts.  The soundbites from the characters are like pieces of candy strung along the way between facts and they relate to and back up the facts.  All the time the nat sound fades in and out doing the same thing, relating to what he is saying and introducing the next sound bite.  This makes the whole piece seamless.

I like the closing music at the end, but it seemed a little long.  I wonder though if it wasn’t produced that way to meet studio needs or with the expectation that the anchor could cut in when needed.