On Monday I had an x-ray and an appointment with my surgeon to check on my arm. Let me first discuss the bad, and then I'll move onto good news. A large focus of the appointment was regarding the pain I've been having in my arm. I was told that this is not normal, and she's now confident that this is attributed to the hardware rubbing in there. She's thinking that I'm going to need injections, but I should wait until I'm doing rehab to get them. This is because I can only receive so many of these injections, and my pain is going to be a lot worse when I'm actually using my arm to its fullest in rehabbing it. I shouldn't waste them now. Taking Advil 1-2 times a day is definitely not where I want to be, and I'm getting to that point now where I don't think the Advil is helping all that much. In the morning it's a constant dull ache. By the afternoon the achiness goes away, but it's still sore when I do even basic things like open a door, drive my car, raise my arm, and sometimes even just writing. And I'm icing often too.
Now the good news. My bone grafts are beginning to bridge the gap to the cadaver bone. But at this point I'm still stuck with the same restrictions(8 lbs), so no rehab yet. My strength is decent right now. I need to work on some exercises especially the internal and external rotations. I was weak on those. Flexibility is excellent. My surgeon loves seeing me lift my arm as high as my other one. It's really remarkable with how good my flexibility is. One thing I learned from the appointment is that this cadaver bone will eventually be completely enclosed by my own cells. It's going to take many years though. I was kind of caught off guard by that and now I'm wondering if I'm going to have limitations until that happens.
All things considered I'm happy that the bone graft from my surgery in late July is taking, but I really wish I didn't have this amount of pain in my arm. It's crazy that it's been over two years of having pain in my right arm now. Its almost one year of not being allowed/able to lift heavy stuff also.
The biggest change I have experienced since my last update is my energy level. I'm not taking naps as often as I was. I just feel better. Right now is the best I have felt in a long time. These last two or three weeks I have experienced my most rapid improvement in energy since I finished chemo in late March.
The better I feel, the more I realize how unready I was to go back to school this semester. Like if I would have waited to go back in the spring it would have been so much easier. Those first two months were absolutely brutal. I had to make a lot of adjustments to my daily routine, and after some time I figured out what I needed to do. I can't take all of the credit here though; my mom had some great suggestions that have helped out a lot. I've gained 11 pounds since school started, and this is the healthiest I've felt since getting off chemo. But if I were to do it again I would still return to school this fall because it mostly worked out in the end even though it was not easy.
That's about it. I see my oncologist for my nine-month scans in early January, and I see my surgeon in February for another checkup like I had on Monday. I hope you all have a Happy Thanksgiving!
