Hello everybody.  Today I went to the doctor a little over a week after
spinal surgery.  He took out the 15 staples in the back of my neck and the
neck brace I have been wearing for nearly three weeks, he removed.  He had
originally said I would wear the neck brace for another 6 weeks 24 hours a
day.  The day before Christmas, I went shopping with my daughter.  A day or
two after Christmas, I could not walk without assistance and I could not
feels the keys on the keyboard nor could I read or write Braille.  Yes, I
was freaked out.  I truly felt I was going home to be with the Lord as my
body slowly weakened day by day.  The spinal surgery, after the MRI revealed
the problem, was all in my neck both front and back.  My throat was opened
in the front to put in a titanium plate to fuse two vertebra together.  Then
I was turned over and the back of my neck opened to remove a disk and to
replace it with synthetic bone mass in order to relieve excessive spinal
compression on my spine.  I have a long 6 inch incision running down the
back of my head and down my neck.  No, it doesn't hurt.  In fact, other than
normal post surgical incisional discomfort, I have had no pain of any kind
in my body.  I also have an incision in the right front of my neck where
they made entrance in order to put the plate in place.  No, I cannot feel
the plate but the incision is still puffy and sticks out from my neck.  The
grandchildren think it is cool.  I am walking with the walker but I am
almost learning to walk all over again so I am sort of slow.  Before
surgery, my upper torso felt as if it were balanced on a one legged stool.
In other words, I felt off balance and felt as if I would fall at any
second.  I did fall a couple of times before I finally went to the emergency
room and was admitted to the hospital.  Now my spine feels like it is
perfectly centered and balanced and I have no fear of falling but walking is
still slow.  I also am having physical therapy.  My hands are slowly
returning to normal but are tingly and somewhat numb but at least, though my
typing is slower now, I can feel the keys and I can read Braille a little
now, too.  I will write more later but to say the least, I was more
frightened than at any time of my life.  It was not anxiety type fear,
however, but just the fear of not knowing what was wrong.  No, I was not
injured prior to surgery but the doctor said it was a degenerative thing
occurring over the last year and a half that finally got to the serious
stage of development.  Thank you very much for all your prayers and continue
to pray my hands return to normal.  I think it was the inability to use my
hands normally and to touch things with my fingers that was the most
frightening to me.  By the way, all my lower back pain and problems are
completely gone.  The doc said today that he believed it would take longer
for my hands to recover.  Yes, I learned some spiritual things and have an
idea I will be learning more as times passes.  I will share those things
soon but I just want to write and thank you guys for praying for me.  This
was very hard on all my family, too.  The surgery was scheduled for 7 hours
but turned out to be about five because everything went so well.

Phil.