My Kyphosis Experience: Pre-Surgery

      "I recommend surgery."

What?!

     Not exactly the thing you expect to hear before you even graduate high school.  The possibility of having a surgery is something that fleetingly passes through your mind to be immediately brushed away as never happening. But there I sat in a neurosurgeon's office with my mom, being advised to proceed with an intensive back surgery.

      To back up a little bit, I was diagnosed with Scheuermann's Kyphosis about nine months ago. For those of you who are unfamiliar with it, this type of kyphosis is a genetic disease that causes at least three of the vertebrae in a person's back to become wedge-shaped. As a result, the entire upper back starts to take on a curved "hunchback" appearance. It is normal for the upper back to curve around 20 to 40 degrees, but anything beyond that is considered excessive kyphosis. My upper back curves around 70 degrees. As of right now, my curve isn't getting worse (that we can tell). But if it continues to progress later on in my life (which is not unusual even in someone who does not have Scheuermann's Kyphosis), my heart and lungs could actually start to be compressed. Many people also experience severe back pain with this condition. Surgery would help to straighten my back and prevent the curve from getting worse.

     But we're talking about a spinal surgery here! Any surgery has risks attached to it, but the fact that this surgery would be working with the spine just made the list of risks even longer!

     So my parents and I decided to wait six months before we made our decision. After a lot of prayer and consideration, we decided to go ahead with surgery. Bracing was not going to help, (it is often useful in scoliosis, but not very effective in kyphosis). Exercises that improve posture would not improve my back either because the vertebrae were already wedged.  As a result, the only option that really made sense was surgery.

     So I found myself facing an 8 hour long, 12-vertebrae spinal fusion (plus rods).

(Let's not mention the fact that I've been thoroughly warned it's an extremely painful recovery.)

4-week period of marathon homework sessions. CHECK. Pre-surgery consultation. CHECK. Brace fitting (to be used for a few weeks after surgery). CHECK. Shopping trip for post-surgery friendly clothing of which I had very little before.... CHECK.

This might not look like a lot to fit in one month, but add it all into normal everyday life and it adds up to one crazy month.

Now, the surgery is only TWO days away.

BARELY, two days at that.

     But on the bright side, I have an amazingly supportive family to help me through this. My mom and dad have been with me every step of the way through this entire process, and I know they will continue to be. Plus, my siblings are taking on all of my barn chores while I'm pretty much banned from the area, which I greatly appreciate. (Although I'm going to miss working with the animals. For real. :(

     Most importantly, God's been with me the entire time too. From the start, I've known He's had a reason for putting this obstacle in front of me. I don't know why I was the one who has to deal with this, but I know he's going to use it for his master plan. Knowing this has given me a ton of comfort along the way, plus helped keep me going.

    I'm hoping to keep giving periodic updates about my recovery from the surgery. Hopefully, I can keep you guys up-to-date, and at the same time maybe help other people who are facing the same obstacle know what to expect.

Thank you for bearing with my rambling first blog post and I hope to see you back!

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¡Audios!