D4s L33t B33r P0urs F0rth

January 24, 2010

Niekon’s Back: a short history and upcoming events

Filed under: Me!!!, back injury — Niekon @ 8:26 am

For folks who have been inquiring and not seeing my little updates here and there on Facebook I thought I’d post up more details of what happened and what is going to be happening:

It all started in May/June 2009 when somewhere along the way I tweaked my back just right. In the past I’ve injured my back and not worried about it too much since it would go away a couple of weeks later. But this time it stuck around and got worse as time went by. Finally at the end of July the pain was to the point that I could not walk or stand or sit without there being a lot of pain. I broke down and went to see a doctor. Happy birthday Niekon… you apparently have Sciatica. A condition where the discs are resting against the sciatic nerve in the lower part of your back.
With the initial diagnosis I began trying a battery of medicines to alleviate the pain. The idea was to bring down the inflammation from the disc to that section of the nerves. Nothing was working… and if it did, it wasn’t for a very long period of time. A couple of weeks later after the initial drug treatments and a week off from work I was kicked forward to Sports Medicine where I was given more drugs to try and alleviate the pain, a pain management regimen. But i thought I’d give a more detailed listing/timeline below.

The timeline of the drugs prescribed and everything else:
7/27/09: Naproxen 500mg & Cyclbenzaprine 10mg (aka Naprosyn & Flexeril)… the Naprosyn screwed with my head and it affected my thought process to the point that I was missing certain things with my work process. I was off of those within a couple of weeks.

8/10/09: Methylpredinsolone 4mg & Meloxicam 15mg (aka Medrol & Mobic)… this was the beginning of the steroids being introduced to my system. Thankfully it was only for a week of taking the Medrol. The only issue I had was that the Mobic was alleviating the pain like I thought it should and I was having to watch the clock to pop the next pill.

8/19/09: Endocet 5-325mg & Nortriptyline 10mg (aka Percocet & Nortriptyline)… now we are getting in the more interesting medicines. The percocet was prescribed and I had to physically be there to put in the prescription to the pharmacy and wait about 20-30 minutes while it was retrieved from a safe. The nortriptyline is actually an anti-depressant but they have used it as a pain management tool for people with back pain. It apparently had a 65% success rate. Guess who was in the 35% fail rate?

8/31/09: began physical therapy which included the use of traction (I call it The Rack) and electrical stimulation (The Shocker). The Rack was the main one that was used when I was there. After a while it got the point that I would snooze out for the 20-minute session.

10/02/09: received my first cortisone steroid epidural injection. Would have been the perfect end to my day except i was attending the Star Wars in Concert event later that night. I don’t remember much between getting the shot and waking up a bit before the concert… but apparently I was really out of it. And then part way through the first half of the concert the local anesthetic wore off and it became quite painful to remain in the sitting position. Thankfully we had brought the percocet along just in case and I was feeling not too much pain shortly thereafter. The effects of the short worked nicely for a week or so and then started to wear off quickly.

11/06/09: received my second cortisone steroid epidural. This time there were no concerts to attend that evening… in fact, this was the beginning of what was supposed to be a week long vacation. Oops? There were several plans made and all of them had to be scraped because of my back injury. I couldn’t fly anywhere because I was in too much pain sitting in one place for too long. Imagine me trying to get up after sitting in an airplane for several hours… the pain would be so intense that the noise coming from my mouth would frighten passengers and flight crew alike and I’d be banned from future flights.

12/27/09: second epidural had last a bit longer than the first but I was still in pain. I had finally managed to move back to my computer desk from the couch a couple of weeks prior. Sadly I was still having issues with sitting for any period of time. To add to the already growing pain, I re-aggravated the area while moving my KitchenAid stand mixer… biggest mistake I’d made in several months of dealing with this. Five minutes later I was in so much pain that I knew I was in trouble again. At that point in time I knew that this was not going to go away easily and that I’d be having a third injection or would become a candidate for surgery.

1/14/10: back in to see my Sports Medicine doctor… and the options were put on the table: try to continue dealing with is as is, get the third injection, or surgery. I chose Option #3 and the referral was placed.

1/22/10: went in to meet with the neurosurgeon who would be working on me. Brought Milady along so that she knew what I was about to undergo as well… and to ask any sort of questions I might have missed. The consult/evaluation proved that I was indeed a candidate for surgery.
The notes from that consult are as follows:
“Your MRI shows a right side L5/S1 disc protrusion, which is pressing on the R S1 nerve. This corresponds it the pain that you have in the right hamstring. Most people improve in a 3 month period, but as your systems persist, it is reasonable to undergo surgery.
“Surgery is a mircodiscectomy; patients are usually here for a 23 hour observation. I usually recommend 4-6 weeks off work and no lifting for 6 weeks.
“The most significant ‘risk’ of surgery is recurrent disc herniation, as the aim of surgery is to remove only the displaced fragment.
“I will place you on the OR list. You will be called by our scheduler with the next available date (usually 4-6 weeks out).”

To put it simply… I have a disc that is bulging out between from the spine and is putting pressure on the nerve sack that is below the spinal cord (several inches below the cord for those who might be worried). They will be making about a 2-3 inch incision into my back and will be shaving off that bulging part of my disc that is pressing on the nerve sack. The entire procedure is done via microscope and is about as non-evasive as you can get. For the 6 weeks following the procedure, the most I’ll be able to lift is 5 pounds. After that 6 weeks and when I return to work I can begin slowly increasing the amount of weight I can lift. Around that time I’m also going to be able to begin my workout sessions again on a more regular basis to drop the weight that I’ve managed to gain in the past 6-7 months. When this all went down, I was weighing around 160-170 pounds. I am now a bit over 200 pounds. that was a huge weight gain on my part… and a lot of it was because I was limited to what I could physically do. I really don’t want to have to go out and buy new clothes… so I’m going to work my ass off to get back down to that 160-170 range again.

And that about covers it. I’ll probably be cross-posting this to several places since not everyone reads each one of my journal locations. So if you see this once, you can pretty much ignore it everywhere else.

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December 28, 2009

2009… an interesting year indeed

Filed under: random crap — Niekon @ 2:53 pm

Oh 2009… how I won’t miss you. True, we had some good times together but when it comes down to it I ended up spending most of our time together on my back and there was no fucking involved.

Yes ladies and gentlemen… 2009 was the year Niekon discovered that he was no longer the young spry lad he once thought he was. Somewhere in May or June Niekon managed to injure himself in such a way that it never got better. Instead it decided to get worse and worse to the point that I could no longer stand the pain and gave in… I went to see a doctor (something I had not done since 2004 I think… happy 5 yr anniversary Kaiser!!!). The typical crap… take these and let’s see how it goes… didn’t work? Okay let’s try this now… how about this?… Oh damn, there’s actually a bulge back there. Time to inject your spine with steroids!!!
Will someone please explain to these people that if I’m on my back and you pump my spine with steroids that I’m not getting any exercise thus I will not be bulking up in the correct manner? Please?
Yes… this was the year that Niekon got a bit bigger than he was comfortable with because of these drugs they were shoving into me. And only now am I able to get my sorry ass into a gym again since the injury. And I was doing so well too… I was actually getting to the point of needing a belt again.


But there was other fun and exciting part of 2009…
January – June: the most uneventful time of them all… I think. I don’t seem to recall a lot of anything happening during that time. At least nothing overly noteworthy.

In July, a few of us took off to the Queen Mary for several days to partake in Convergence. We had a lot of fun… mostly. Yes, Niekon ended up with 2nd degree burns on four of his fingers on his left hand on the final night and was a pain in the ass about it and took forever to drag to the ER to deal with. But on the other hand, Niekon zonked out on pain pills can be quite hilarious. “But I have a reservation!!!! And it’s in my name!!!” I will never live that night down.

A month later we all took off from work for a weekend at BlizzCon 2009. A lot of craziness and insanity… even with me in constant pain and popping pain pills as soon as I was supposed to pop them. But I think everyone enjoyed themselves… lots of drinking and food to be had.

A few weeks later Milady and I were up at DLR of the 40th Anniversary of the Haunted Mansion… a lot of money spent but I got a nice walking cane which was put to immediate use as soon as it was in my hands. Event was overall so-so… the dinner was not that thrilling. I could have whipped up something a lot more exciting better tasting than whatever it was that they gave us.
Right after that event was Disney’s D23 Expo just down the street at the Anaheim Convention Center. Again, the cane came in VERY handy even though I was once again popping pain pills like they were going out of style. 4 days of what seemed to be exciting events that turned out to be only a few exciting events if you could get into them. My highlight of the event was seeing the Tron Legacy trailer in 3D and then watching the original Tron movie digitally restored.

October started out with a bang… actually, more like a shot. A shot to my spine to be exact. Somehow I managed to schedule my 1st epidural shot on the same day that I was to be attending the Star Wars In Concert event at The Pond (I mean Honda Center). Let’s just say that me drugged out on a local and having that wear off halfway though the concert? Made for an exciting rest of the evening.
The latter part of October was spent at Oktoberfest… lots of beer and food… not enough wenches. ^_~

November we were supposed to be heading out to the Dallas/Ft. Worth area for a few days to visit a friend but my doctor’s nixed that idea stating that me and planes are not good friends right now. So instead I spent my week long vacation getting another shot again and taking a couple of trips into the Disney parks to check out the new Princess & The Frog stuff.
November closed out with Thanksgiving dinner for Milady, CacheCrash, and me. That dinner proved to be a chase… Cache and I spent half of that Thursday morning hunting for our meal only to find what we were looking for in the back of an Asian market… 3 large Maine lobsters. So they sat in my fridge for several hours before taking the trip into a large pot of boiling water. They were not thrilled with that choice but it was either them or me. They almost did win a couple of battles but in the end the war was won and we dined.

December rolled in and Milady and I hosted our somewhat annual holiday gathering that ended in the playing of Rock Band… YouTube videos… and somehow someone telling me that I need to record my own cooking show to post online.
Christmas weekend was mostly spent with Milady working long and ofter VERY early hours and me sitting at home playing video games or watching movies. Hmmm… sounds like how most of my New Year’s weekend is going to be spent too.

Though, to close out 2009 and bring in 2010 I will be completely shaving off the beast that currently resides on my face and cutting off the floppy mop on the top of my head… photos will be taken of the before and after at least. No idea if we are going to document it any further than that. Might have to get a shot of the ponytail getting lopped off though. Oh Niekon… how will you survive? Your strength will be taken from you forever!!! I will have to figure something out I guess…

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December 15, 2009

battle of the airlines…

Filed under: random crap — Niekon @ 9:46 am

Air New Zealand throws down the challenge to Southwest Airlines…


and Southwest Airlines responds…


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November 18, 2009

since it’s that time of year again…

Filed under: random crap — Niekon @ 3:35 pm

Alrighty folks… I was trying to figure out if I wanted to do this or not but after some consideration I said fuck it… let’s do it… ^_^

For those who are giving gifts this year… I have a favor, please actually make a donation to Child’s Play or get something off of one of the hospital wish lists. Much appreciated… I need more stuff in my place like I need another bulged disc.

For those visiting this holiday season… no, there is no tree. It was decided that we would hold off this year given that we are having a small holiday gathering and space is limited as is. So don’t be surprised when the traditional big green thing isn’t there in all of it’s ornamented and lit glory.

that is it… back into my little cubby hole.

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November 2, 2009

contemplating…

Filed under: random crap — Niekon @ 6:36 am

thinking of doing a holiday party this year… nothing too big and involved… but at least a little something. Still trying to figure out the logistics of everything and whatnot if we do have one. Though I think this may be the first year we don’t have a tree up…

Also… congrats to Milady for her first raid run last night. She survived the Safety Dance on her first attempt… and somehow survived Gluth. ^_^

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October 20, 2009

oh no… Luxo Jr. !!!!!

Filed under: random crap — Niekon @ 8:36 am


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October 9, 2009

preparing for next weekend…

Filed under: random crap — Niekon @ 7:44 am

bad movie… hilarious mash-up…



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October 8, 2009

Filed under: random crap — Niekon @ 6:23 am

because someone at some film studio got a hair up their ass the Zombieland bit was yanked so I deleted that post… so to make it up to all of you I’m giving you a little Funny or Die for your morning….


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October 6, 2009

because someone asked me to post it up here…

Filed under: Disney — Niekon @ 1:58 pm

Pure laziness… I swear… ^_~
For those of you who aren’t aware, this was posted up last week on the anniversary of WDW’s Magic Kingdom using a format known as tilt-shift photography. Maybe one of my photo buff friends or family members can clue folks in on how this process is done.

disregard request for how it’s done… I looked it up along with prices for the lenses and just about fell out of my chair. That lens is about what I paid for my laptop… O_o



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September 28, 2009

update on my back…

Filed under: back injury — Niekon @ 11:28 am

this past Friday I went in for my MRI. That experience was not something I look forward to participating in again… I can see where claustrophobic people go crazy in them. The check-in was just off of the main lobby of the hospital and once I went through all of that check-in crap I was instructed to go down this one long hallway, turn left down another long hallway, turn right and go outside and follow this path to some other building.

Yeah… that was fun O_o
Empty my pockets of all metal… remove piercings and rings… hop on the slab and insert earplugs. Twenty minutes later and I was on my way home again.

**flash forward to Monday**

I go into work in the morning for a couple of hours to deal with some paperwork before heading off to another appointment as a follow-up for the treatment I’ve been under for the past five weeks. Nothing exciting… no good results from the meds. And what do I see before my eyes? The scans from the MRI. It was rather surreal to see my spin there.
Sure enough… right at the L5 was a bulge on the right side of the disc. Regular means have not helped to solve the problem and given that I’ve been like this for 2-3 months now it was decided that I can take one of two roads at this time: a non-invasive procedure that requires an injection into that area (an epidural) or an invasive procedure that would be scraping of the spine.
Anyone care to take a guess at which I chose first? *ding ding ding* We have a winner… I went for the injection into my spine. The lesser of two evils as one would say. So the referral has been submitted and I should be getting a call in a couple of days to schedule the epidural in the next week or so. One way or another, I am going to get fixed. I’m just hoping that this only has to go as far as this. And I know that everyone else would love for me to get better because I’m a pain in the ass when I’m not comfortable. ^_~

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