Oct. 27: Wherein I freak out a little

Previously, on What’s Causing Jen’s Back Pain?…

Jen’s evil doctor, thinking her back pain can be fixed with chiropractic adjustments, decides to pass off the mystery of her continuing pain to her rheumatologist. Rheumatologist’s next appointment is two months away. Whatever will Jen do in the meantime?

Tonight, on What’s Causing Jen’s Back Pain?…

The latest in the continuing saga.

I’ve had way too many sleepless nights in the past few weeks. For several months I’ve had to sleep sitting up, but recently it’s been painful even to do that. I take four Advil at midnight and am up again at 3 a.m. in excruciating pain. I can’t live like this. I have three more weeks before my date with the rheumatologist, and that’s much too long to go without sleep. I went back to see my regular doctor today.

He asked me to remind him when all this started, what possibly caused it, all that stuff we’ve gone through a thousand times. But it seems he had forgotten about my great fall in June. Suddenly he had all sorts of questions about the location of my pain, how severe it gets, what relieves it, and what makes it worse—again, things we’ve gone over before. But this time, he suggested that I might-possibly-maybe-could have a compression fracture.

Do you know what a compression fracture is? It’s a broken friggin’ back.

The doctor ordered x-rays, and I had them taken immediately at the hospital. Fortunately, I don’t have to wait for the radiologist to send my doctor the report and then wait for my doctor to contact me. Victor got the radiologist’s report this afternoon because he’s sleeping with the radiologist. Or maybe he just works with him. I don’t know. I don’t pay attention to that kind of stuff.

I spent much of the afternoon in an oh-my-god state. On the one hand, I was concerned about what it would mean if my back actually IS broken. Surgery? Wheelchair? Would I have to move in with Nana, horror of horrors? On the other hand, I was so glad to actually be doing something to solve this painful mystery, I almost felt cheery. Almost.

The radiologist found some mild lumbar disc degeneration at L4-5. No spondylolysis or spondylolisthesis. Pedicles appear intact. (I have pedicles! I have no idea what those are, but they sound like genitalia! Hee hee!) The only remarkable part of the report: “The patient appears to have six nonrib-bearing vertebral bodies.” Most people have five vertebrae. I have six. This means I am a mutant freak, and I have no choice but to join the circus. It’s been lovely knowing you all. Please see me when I visit your town.

The good news is that the radiologist didn’t see a compression fracture; my back is most likely not broken. I expect I’ll hear from my doctor soon and we’ll see what the next step will be—we’re guessing it’ll involve either an MRI or euthanasia. Until then, I’ve been OK’d to take more Advil and some potent sleeping pills. I don’t want to do this for the long term, but I think it’ll be alright until I start traveling with the freak show crowd.

More later, I hope.