Diagnosis Moida

I headed to the specialist today to get a different view on my injury. of course, right after I had booked the appointment I started to feel better. I considered canceling but I figured i had back slid before and i didn’t want to be kicking myself in a couple weeks. I would rather go in there and waste an hour of her well paid time than drag this out. I may be glad I did.

I got there at 2, filled out my info then stood around until 2:30. I tried to sit, as I was feeling pretty decent today. Unfortunately they had those terrible waiting room chairs that everyone has. These are the chairs I sat it that really set this injury off and made me miss those first days of work. So I literally stood around.

At 2:30 I was led to an examine room and given a gown. Then I waited 15 minutes. The doc (she’s a nurse practitioner really but, you get the idea) came in, ran down my complaints as laid out in my paperwork I had filled out. She ran me through the same basic maneuvers as everyone has: no pain on touching my spine, I can bend forward, I can’t bend backward very far. She declared it was time for an x-ray. I hadn’t really expected and x-ray for a muscle issue but, it turns out, she had something in mind.

I went in and did 3 x-rays: standing with my back to the plate, standing with my injured side to the plate and lying with my injured side to the plate. Then I hung out while they checked the x-rays, we shot one a second time just to make sure it was the right contrast. I was shuffled back to the room and changed back.

The doc (NP) came back and announced that we didn’t have a solution but might be closer to one. Then she popped the X-rays up. First the front shot. I couldn’t see a whole lot of anything. The good news is that there wasn’t a whole lot to see, nothing broken, chipped or anything. Then she popped up the two side shots. Between each vertebra is a gap, they appear more pronounced in the standing image. Just above the first lumbar vertebra above the sacrum (L5 I guess) the gap is about 1/3 – 1/2 the thickness of the other ones near it. This she says is indicative of a ruptured disc.

I must confess that I was and am skeptical. Maybe I’m skeptical because it’s a hard truth to swallow. I think, though, that I am skeptical because I feel like the stretching shouldn’t have caused more discomfort with a ruptured disc. Maybe because I feel like i shouldn’t feel a difference after therapy sessions and I do. I dunno.

She told me that she couldn’t possibly make a complete diagnosis based on an x-ray alone and gave me a prescription for an MRI and instructions on who I should book it with an how. I’m booked for tomorrow afternoon. I get to take the images in when I’m done with the MRI, I’m hoping they aren’t sealed so I can look at them.

She gave me instructions not to lift weight and to keep taking ibuprofen and sent me packing. I’ll know more after my next appointment.