Microdiscectomy Diary - Intro

The Injury
It was only when I looked back at old posts prior to writing this one that I noticed this comment in a blog from 2007: "partly due to a niggling back injury".

I started playing golf in 2007 and at some point around then I hurt my back lifting my clubs from my car outside the driving range. It wasn't the weight of the golf bag, it was just the action of leaning over and putting all of the strain on my lower back. 

That Summer I kept wicket twice each weekend. I didn't give my back a chance to recover properly. But over the Winter it did improve. However the 2008 cricket season proved to be a struggle. I gave up the wicket keeping but I was being troubled by what I later realised was sciatica. At times I couldn't run, with my left leg causing me problems. I struggled through the season, but early the following season I admitted defeat. I simply was not physically able to play cricket any more. 

At times during the subsequent years my back was fine. No pain and no restrictions on my mobility. But every now and then I would do something to aggravate it. In December 2011 I cleared out the garage and took a car load of bulky waste to the council tip. I didn't know at the time but I had really wrecked my back.

2 days later I started having severe pain in my lower back. It got worse and worse. Just after Christmas sciatica was added to my back pain. This was exacerbated by a long drive to Blackpool followed by the best part of 3 hours on an uncomfortable seat watching a friend in panto. By now it was becoming clear that this was more serious than previous bouts. 

One night in January the pain became excruciating. My left buttock, my thigh, my foot. Such horrendous pain, and the only relief I could obtained was from prescription pain killers. My doctor diagnosed sciatica and prescribed Tramadol for the pain and diazepam to relax my muscles. The pain died away to be replaced by numbness down the back of the left leg and my left foot. Physiotherapy failed to improve matters, and by the late Summer I returned to my doctor. 

The Diagnosis
An MRI scan shed some light. I had a herniated L5S1 disc in my spine. Or to put it another way, a slipped disc that was pressing on my sciatic nerve. My doctor referred me to the neurosurgery department at Addenbrookes Hospital in Cambridge.

I saw a consultant neurosurgeon who told me that he would like to operate. He could take the pressure off the sciatic nerve and give me a fighting chance of being able to live a more active life. There were risks. Boy were there risks.

• paraplegia
• loss of bowel and bladder control
• loss of sexual function

Was it really worth risking such consequences? To avoid potential medico-legal problems the surgeon had to tell me these risks existed. But he also told me that he had never had one of these ops go wrong and expected to go through his career without one going wrong. Reading between the lines, he was saying that this was a pretty routine operation. Even so, it was scary. If the chances of a problem are 1500:1 you don't want to be the 1. I opted to have the operation. Then I waited.

I was called by Addenbrookes at the start of November, offering me an operation date that clashed with the European Quiz Championships in Estonia. The EQC is the highlight of my year and I was prepared to put my operation below it in the pecking order, partly due to the money I had paid out and partly due to not wanting to let teammates down. 

The Pre-op

Upon my return from Estonia I was offered a new date: the 5th Feb. My pre-op visit on the 25th Jan was almost to the day 1 year from the worst of my sciatic pain. Rather naively I thought the pre-op would be a quick affair. Not a chance. The pre-op took over 3 hours. I would sit in the day room of ward A3 at Addenbrookes waiting for people to come for me. First up a nurse came to take some blood. Back to the day room. Another nurse took me for a blood pressure test and MRSA swabs. A few questions asked and then back to the day room. Next up a surgeon who asked me a host of questions about the history of my condition. I wasn't sure why this was needed. Surely my consultant had already recorded all this. He tested my reflexes, determining that the failure of my leg to act as it should was evidence that I was telling the truth. Back to the day room. Finally a nurse came and asked me more questions. All of this took a whole morning.

As my op date approached I reorganised my work life to accommodate a length absence. 90 minutes before I was due to finish work before the op I got a call. My op was postponed. The surgeon was needed elsewhere. I was distraught. The operation was a frightening prospect, but I was also desperate to have it done. Towards the end I felt that I was clinging on by my fingernails. The light at the end of the tunnel had been switched off. At least for a while.

I was eventually given a new date: 9th March. Cue chaos in my work and personal life, but at least the light at the end of the tunnel was back on. 

The next blogs will chronicle my operation and my recovery. If nothing else I hope to give others facing the same op an indication of what they might expect.