Thanks, guys.

The regulars know I've been out with health problems, but that isn't what has slowed down my posting so much lately. People like MikeML, wayneh, GopherT, MrChips, maxheadroom, (and a few others) have been answering the questions in my area of knowledge so well that I can't add anything useful to the threads. Good job! Glad to have so many helpful and competent people on this site!

Number Twelve

 

Well said #12.

Hope your health is improving.

 

HA! I always look for threads with few or no answers posted. Not much of those lately.

 

Just get well,earth lacks good people!

 

Well said #12.

Hope your health is improving.

Actually, I'm at about 98% recovery now, and I'll stay that way as long as I quit swapping truck engines (alone), chopping down trees, moving furniture, and installing wooden fences (alone)...but the fact that I was still doing those things at 63 years old tells you why. I simply refused to act my age until my body notified me that I was doing something wrong.

Oh well. I guess it's time to sell the 32 foot ladder and the engine crane.

 

Be careful chopping down trees alone,my family friend recently got killed because he was your age and went falling trees alone.

 

Actually, I'm at about 98% recovery now, and I'll stay that way as long as I quit swapping truck engines (alone), chopping down trees, moving furniture, and installing wooden fences (alone)...but the fact that I was still doing those things at 63 years old tells you why. I simply refused to act my age until my body notified me that I was doing something wrong.

Oh well. I guess it's time to sell the 32 foot ladder and the engine crane.

Well good on ya! Just hold on to the ladder and crane for a while, I'm convinced that not stopping is the answer, may be just get some help next time?

 

I'm convinced that not stopping is the answer, maybe just get some help next time?

Apparently you haven't read the MRI report. It says really nasty things like, "degenerative changes in every lumbar disk" and, "complete effacement of the left articular recess". I don't know exactly what that means, but I'm still in pain 4 months later, and apparently I'm one stupid move away from choosing between surgery and a wheelchair. Helper drops his end of the couch and I'm a paraplegic? No thanks, pal. My business partner started down this path about 20 years ago, and tomorrow, I'm going to his funeral. He was 8 years younger than I am.

I probably wouldn't mind dying at 83 years old. It's the 20 years of multiple surgeries, serious disability, and constant pain that I want to avoid. Point is, I've seen where this ends up, and I still have the opportunity to avoid that choice. I'm looking at this from a very frightening point of view.

 

"No thanks, pal."

I'm sure he didn't mean anything but you did say you're 98% recovered. It doesn't sound like it!

Maybe you should have included the MRI report in your previous post?

 

Apparently you haven't read the MRI report. It says really nasty things like, "degenerative changes in every lumbar disk" and, "complete effacement of the left articular recess". I don't know exactly what that means, but I'm still in pain 4 months later, and apparently I'm one stupid move away from choosing between surgery and a wheelchair. Helper drops his end of the couch and I'm a paraplegic? No thanks, pal. My business partner started down this path about 20 years ago, and tomorrow, I'm going to his funeral. He was 8 years younger than I am.

I probably wouldn't mind dying at 83 years old. It's the 20 years of multiple surgeries, serious disability, and constant pain that I want to avoid. Point is, I've seen where this ends up, and I still have the opportunity to avoid that choice. I'm looking at this from a very frightening point of view.

There definitely comes a time when we must stop fooling ourselves and realistically evaluate what we can and cannot reasonably do anymore. I'm in somewhat of the opposite end of the spectrum in that I've lost enough weight and gotten into enough better shape that I am trying to identify the things that I haven't been able to do but that now I might, at least for a while. But all the while I am trying to force myself to remain aware of the fact that I am not 20 years old, but rather on the verge of 50 and that that alone, not to mention the decades of being 200 lb overweight, has consequences. I just don't know what they are yet. But, like you, I am determined to heed the message early so that the next two or three decades might be a lot better, albeit it probably more limited, than they might have been otherwise.

 

I'm 67 and maybe, just maybe I quit doing the foolish things in time to save my life. I wish you a speedy and complete recovery.

 

#12, You are a wise chap and doing what needs to be done. It's time to stop the heavy lifting and climbing. It's time to listen to and take care of your body. Wishing you a successful recovery.

 

Should it come to surgery I can point you to a great one: the one who ripped my spine bare L4 L5 and S1, dissected the bones and rotor rooted the spinal cord. No pain and general improvement day to day.

This doctor worked my wife's back over 12 years ago, she is completely fine today, as are the 5 or 6 other people she recommended to this doctor.

If you're they type to look for fancy titles and such, she is the Chief of Neurosurgery at her hospital.

You just have to make it to NY.

 

Sorry if that came across a bit sharp, sirch. I'm working from a place of fear right now.

I guess I should define, "98% recovered". I am 98%% recovered from being an inpatient that couldn't sit up, stand up, or even turn my head to drink from a straw. I have a little pain in my butt that never goes away, but it doesn't stop what most people call, "daily activities". Spectators can't tell anything is wrong with me, 98% of the time. I think this is as good as it's going to get, and I'll take it...with gratitude!

I am not even a little bit recovered from being 64 years old (as of 2 weeks ago) and I don't expect to recover from, "varying degrees of disc height loss and disc dessication within all levels of the lumbar spine". Humans don't recover from that. Nobody finds out they are 2 inches shorter than they were as a teenager, do some therapy and some exercises, and get back to their original maximum height. Apparently I can recover from a squished disc, at least enough to ambulate and change a light bulb, but I'm never again going to try rolling out from under a truck with a sick transmission on my chest.

I had a good, long run of being able to do anything I wanted to do. How many 63 year old people do you know that can install an oxygen sensor and a fuel injector, mow the lawn, and lift one end of a full size couch over their head in one day? Probably zero. Utterly amazing for an amputee! But injuries accumulate and time catches up with everybody. At certain ages, we become less flexible, less able to recover quickly, less muscular, and less quick. Do the kind of things I did, and your discs slowly squish. I found my limit for that exercise! I can still exercise, but not by doing, "clean and jerks". If that's as bad as it gets, I'm satisfied.

Ref: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clean_and_jerk

 

No worries, you do what you need to do.