After a month of waiting, distracting myself with video games, my surgery date was finally upon me. What I failed to mention was the way the surgeon reduced the risks. They achieved this by splitting it into two parts. I was going to be given what they called halo traction. For gamers, that sounds much cooler than what it is. It is not like Halo at all. I would have preferred to become a spartan, then go through traction. Halo traction is where they drill a device into your skull and gently stretch a severely curved spine over a long period. They do this to reduce the trauma of straightening it all at once.
I went into surgery, and when I woke up; I had a circular band of metal screwed to my head, which took a few days to get used to. It caused me a lot of pain in the beginning. I woke up in more pain after that than I did after my next surgery, an extensive spinal fusion which we will get into later. After day 1 of having a circular band of metal screwed to my head, they added weight to the pulley system that made traction work. This allowed the spine to stretch. They added a pound each day until they reached half of my body weight.
Being strapped to this contraption twenty-four/seven was a very frustrating experience. If I wanted to move from one spot to another. I had to get a nurse to shift weight from my bed, wheelchair, or walker, so my spine was constantly in traction. I once waited twenty minutes to use the bathroom, but that wasn’t the worst of it. The kicker was something no one saw coming. I couldn't get most food down. Whenever I would eat, it would get stuck about halfway down my esophagus where it would stay until my body decided it was time to throw it up. This entire experience just added to the torture I was enduring. It went on for a week and not being able to eat caused even more stress because I was losing weight. This was terrible for me because I was already severely underweight, which the doctors were not happy about to begin with. There was risk of them either putting a feeding tube in or moving my second surgery back, leaving me in this torturous state of traction even longer.
They sent me for a test to see why I couldn't get food down. This test was also not a pleasant experience as I had to drink a very chalky liquid which I struggled not to vomit back up as I did many other things. Luckily, that didn’t happen. The test came back normal and was inconclusive. Miraculously, after a few days, I could eat without a problem again and started consuming an extra thousand calories a day to leave as soon as possible. I was ready to go home and I still had about two weeks before my second surgery.
You may wonder how I got through this tough time, escapes from reality and looking to the future, when all of this would be over. No matter how many times I was beaten down, I would rise up again and keep on pushing through. That is the key to living your best life. I learned that from video games and I implement that into my life every day. I knew I could get through this, I could get through anything. I was fortunate to be a VIP patient and could get a PS4 to use as an escape from reality. I played a lot of Call of Duty and connected with a cousin I had talked with little because of how far away he lived now. It was the best thing that had come out of the whole surgery, other than not dying of course. My nurses would come in as I was murdering zombies and some of them would sit and watch as I obliterated my enemies for a few minutes. They often fought over getting on my schedule since I was such an easygoing patient. I wanted little, just to play my video games.
The days went by and they gave me some great news. Because of my progress and good reaction to traction, they could move up my surgery. Some bad news that I took very well shortly followed this, because I did not realize the full extent of what this meant. I was so ecstatic that I did not fully consider what I was just told. I was so done with being tied down with halo traction, I could barely move, my body was locked in place. Little did I know how much the end of my traction experience would foreshadow a good portion of how I would feel within my body for the rest of my life. However, that is a story for another day.
Subscribe to my newsletter below to stay updated on my next post about the second phase of my surgery and how that bad news would change my life forever. Also consider checking out my Etsy shop and gaming channel. The first video should be coming soon. Yes, I have said that before. I keep running into issues with recording however, I believe that I have finally ironed out all the wrinkles. You can also follow my social media accounts linked in my website to stay up to date on all things Blazing Phoenix.
Comments