Pray? Why?

Sunday, June 3rd, I tried to move a heavy roll-top desk, a few inches to make room for a coming cuddle recliner. I sent my daughter and her husband to Pamida to get the chair and I began preparing the corner I planned to put it in.

I have an issue with my lumbar region in my back. L4 and L5 are requiring some medical attention to alleviate pain and repair some disk damage. I have been given shots in that area for almost two years now and the last two shots were not helping as much anymore. Monday, the 4th, I was planning on calling the doctor to get the ball rolling on a mild stenosis procedure he'd been wanting me to consider. So with this knowledge, pushing on the desk, or lifting and pulling, was out of the question. But I thought I could sit on the floor and put my feet on the desk and my back against the wall and, puuussssh, using my whole body to move the desk. I've moved many a heavy object in this fashion before and it has worked. Who needs those slidders, anyway!?

I did get it to move 1/4 of an inch and then...

     ... SNAP!!!!!!! OR WE CAN CALL THIS A POP!!!! BUT WHATEVER IT WAS, IT WAS LOUD, LIKE A GUN SHOT, AND I WAS DIEING!!!!

Ok, I didn't die but, oh my, that pain was seared in my brain and cataloged under OH SHIT!!!!!!

At first my back arched and my breath was sucked away and my whole body was suddenly extremely hot. The pain was so great, I couldn't breathe and I truly thought I would pass out and, did I say, my body temperature was HOT?! Sweat began to pour out of every pore in my body!! My eyes filled of tears and all I could do is moan. When I could, I fell to the right side on floor and struggled, still in a pain, a pain I swear was worse then when I gave birth to my children(!), to lay flat on back with knees on my chest. There I lay and moaned til I could get my breath back. In rasps, I tried to call for help.

My husband and grandson were outside so I knew they would not hear me. I don't think they would have even heard me if they'd of been in the house!

I started crying and in my head I began pleading over and over "help me ... oh please, help me Lord. I'm so sorry, I'm soooo soooo sorry. (After all, I did have thoughts that I was being unwise trying to move that desk by myself ... if at all!) Please Lord, don't let my back be broken! Please Lord, I have to work. Please Lord, I have so much to do. Please Lord, please!"

I don't know how long it was before I could try to move again. Maybe 40 minutes went by before I was able to do so and though the pain didn't seem as bad, it was still unbearable! I managed to crawl. Every crawl was riddled in pain but I finally managed to get to stairwell and down the stairs. I took a break on the cool kitchen floor. By now my clothes and my hair were sticking to my sweaty body that looked like I had run through the sprinkler. While laying there I was thinking, "this is bad, really bad! I'm going to have to go to the hospital."

Now tell me why, if you know, would I suddenly begin to worry about my appearance in the midst of this horrid pain? I struggled from my laying position, knees on chest, to my crawling mode again and crawled into the bathroom, pulled myself onto the toilet and could reach the bathroom mirror and sink from there. My curling iron was also with-in reach. So there I sat, crying and yelping when I'd move and get stabbed with more waves of pain and curled my bangs, put my sweat wet hair in a bun on my head, wet a wash cloth, laying on sink, with cold water and then slid off toilet to floor and crawled into living room and laid again on my back with knees to chest and began to wipe the sweat off my body and leaving the cool wash cloth on my neck.

I waited for my husband to come into the house to find me. By now, I knew I wasn't dieing and I may just survive this after all.

It had been over 1 1/2 hours from when my back snapped/popped and my husband had still not come into the house. I struggled back into a crawling position and began crawling to the deck door to try to get my husband's attention. But before I reached the door, a motorcycle rode into the yard. I sure didn't want to have my husband's friend see the mess I was in so I crawled back to the stairs where I had a cane, I used infrequently, leaning on the railing. I pulled myself up onto the steps and sat for about a half hour before grandson came in the house and found me crying on the steps. He sat down beside me and I told him Nana hurt her back and in his sweet little way he tried to rub my owie.

Finally, I tried to stand and, with much effort, accomplished this feat. Standing wasn't as difficult as I feared. I immediately became aware that I was standing different than before the snap. My back seemed straighter. Before it was too painful to stand straight. Now it was too painful to bend forward and I absolutely could not bend back! To bend down had to be with a straight back and legs bent. (A position my husband has nagged me to bend in, ever since my back became an issue over 4 years ago.) Ok, at this point I decided that I would not incur the cost to go to the emergency room and felt that if I could just get the pain to subside, I could stick it out til I could get ahold of a doctor.

Well, to make this long story shorter, my husband finally did make it into the house to find out why I didn't come out to say hi to our friend. By then I could get around with a cane so he never knew the extent my suffering.

My daughter and her husband arrived from town and we finished that evening out with a barbecue. I could get around but only with the help of that cane and I went about very slowly. I could not cough! Oh what pain that would trigger!! The pain was not as extreme as when my back snappened but a constant pain at level 8-10 on a VAS pain scale was no picnic either!

After the kids took thier family home, my husband ran me a hot bath with Lavender oil and later he added Epsom salts with a variety of soothing oils. That enabled me to become more mobile and I added Ibuprofen and Aleve, praying for relief.

I could not get comfortable. Pain bearable and pain unbearable and in waves ...

So I posted on Facebook,
a call out to all the prayer warriors,
to help stand with me in prayer for relief.

I have no time reference for when the pain became bearable. It seemed to be a gradual process but by Tuesday I was moving nearly normal without the aide of a cane.

I didn't sleep well Sunday night, but I made it til Monday morning when I could call my doctor. My present medial team is located in North Platte, NE. They wanted me go to Ogallala hospital for MRI or x-ray but I told them I would rather try to wait til Thursday. They offered pain meds but I told them I didn't want to medicate the pain, I wanted to fix what was causing the pain. I've been on pain meds and I know the drill. I know what they do to me. I have an addict personality and hate what I become on them ... so, no ... for now.

AND I really believe in the power of prayer and honestly felt like I could survive the level of pain I was experiencing by then. That was Monday morning and the pain progressively abated until it became bearable by Monday night.

The power of prayer?

How else could I walk and even work at my cleaning job and care for my adorable grandson? And when doctor called me on Friday with the results of the MRI, he was concerned with the damage recorded and scheduled me for Vertebroplasty surgery on Monday, June 11. He informed me that I had a compression fracture of the L1 vertebrae and the previous area of concern, the L4-L5 area, was worse. Seems my walking around and not taking any pain medications is remarkable for the pain level such an injury can incur. How else could I be able to endure this, except by the power of prayer and the Power of the Lord responding to those prayers?

I pray that the Lord God, Father of Jesus, my Lord, will be willing to touch the hand of the doctor and guide him to heal without risk, and that my back would be restored and healed, not only in this new L1 lumbar area but also in the L4-L5 that will require attention after Mondays surgery. Lord, Thy Will Be Done. And thank You, Lord for Your merciful grace and thanks to all of those whose stand with me in prayer. Bless you all!!

Note:  And that cuddle chair recliner? Turns out I was two days late for the sale (chair was $499 and went on sale for $200 less) and Pamida wouldn't honor the sale price. Which turned out to be ok since the back wouldn't come off so chair could be moved in two pieces. It was too big to get up the stairs to my office. So broke my back for nothing. :(