The morning of my reinject, I was in pretty good shape. The soreness of the marrow draw had worn off, and I was prepared for recovery with some new jammies and a stack of great books, thanks to my amazing friends. (Seriously, I have the best friends in the world.) I worked on focusing on my energy on being excited to spend some time catching up on some great reading and some much
needed rest instead of being nervous about the upcoming needle pokes. Tiny needles, very tiny needles. Tiny little needles that this wimp is terrified of. Irrational? Yes. Controllable? Not so much. You’d think with all the pokes and prods I’d been through over the past few years would have desensitized me to the process a bit, but it hasn’t. I’m needle phobic. (something that Dr. Schultz pointed out to be a bit comical, considering I willingly signed up to get a tattoo, but that is different. SO different. Again, no one ever accused me of being rational.)
Mesenchymal Stem Cells -Such Tiny Things, Hoping They'll Make a Big Difference!
Moving on.
I was expecting the cell reinject procedure to feel comprable to one of the many Epidural Steroid Injections I’d had in the past, so I wasn’t too worried about how it was going to go pain-wise.
I was wrong.
Holy hurty, Batman!
I’ve jumped ahead. Lets start at the beginning.
On the way to my appointment, my mom and I stopped and grabbed breakfast. One of the many things I love about this whole Regenexx thing is the eating before the procedure thing. None of that “you’ll be under heavy anesthesia, so no food past midnight or you’ll turn into a gremlin” crap. Love. It.
More Mesenchymal Stem Cells. Say That Three Times Fast..
Oh yeah, back on track. Again. Okay, so we showed up for my appointment, and I put on my superawesome hospital gown and waited to go have some blood taken. Instead, they directed me into the procedure room. No blood draw this time, YAY! Except, just kidding, they just decided to take it during the procedure. Bummer. Whatever though, the track marks from all of the blood I’d had removed were the least of my worries.
Dr. Centeno came in and got me all set up, explained that my cells had done their thing, and they were ready to be put back in. (Yay! Good work little cells!) He numbed me up, and started injecting the cells back in. Right about then I started feeling one of the worst sensations I’ve ever felt, it almost hurt bad enough that I couldn’t verbally express to him how bad it hurt. Because no air would move in or out of my body. At all. (at that point, my mom said “just take some deep breaths kiddo” -if looks could kill, I wouldn’t have had a ride home.) Dr. Centeno stepped in around that point and told me that in order to get the best regrowth results, he really had to “piss off the disc” -and piss it off he did. Wow. It felt like every muscle from my knees to my shoulder blades had completely siezed up and were working together to squeeze the life out of me. He let me know that I just needed to be patient for a moment, and let those little cells get situated, and then he could numb it up a bit more. Patient? Had he met me? Patient is not something I excel at. Not even a little bit.
After what felt like days, but in reality was probably less than four minutes, he tossed some Lidocaine into the mix and we were friends again. Best friends. That is the beauty of anesthesia, even if you cause someone’s pain, the minute you make it float away, you are instantly their favorite person in the world. My dad does anesthesia, and has made reference to that before, but I never fully understood what he meant until that very moment. That sense of relief was better than a new pair of Jimmy Choos. Didn’t think that was possible until right then.
So Tired, So Hopeful That This Will Work!
Somewhere in the middle of that they took some more blood. (seriously, WHERE is all of that blood going?)
Another thing I love about Regenexx, it probably took them longer to set up for my procedure than the procedure took, which is great for someone as patience-deficient as I am. They had me hang on the table for a few minutes to let everything settle, and then I was free to go.
I hobbled back to my room, the searing pain gone, but the results of stiff muscles showing when I tried to get dressed to go home. Every time I tried to move, that horrible pain crept in around the edges of the numbness. As much as I love those hideous hospital gowns, I did not want to wear one home with me. My mom had to help me get dressed, as I was having a pretty hard time moving my torso at that point.
We made the trek home, and I took my butt straight to the couch to nap. Because of my laziness, it took me a few hours to realize Adam had gotten my mom to sneak some gorgeous flowers up to my room for me. By the time I got upstairs later that afternoon, I was greeted by the cheer and amazing scent from the flowers. A very nice pick me up. Good job, husband!
The Flowers. Nice work, Jones!
Somewhere between the time I signed up and the time I went in for my reinject, they decided to switch up the injection schedule -one of the fun things about being part of a study. Jen (remember Jen from my first Regenexx post? Hi Jen!!) let me know that instead of following up with my next injection the following week, we’d be waiting a week to give things some time to settle. Instead, I’d do an IMS treatment (I’ll talk about that in my next post. Awesome stuff.) the following week, and then an injection the week after that. Fine with me, I wanted them to do whatever would work best in the long run. This was costing us a lot of money out of pocket (hey FDA, you should get on with the approving of this so that my craptastic insurance that I spend a lot of money paying for will help me out a bit! Thanks!) and was taking me from home and work for over a month. Because I live over 3 hours (and several mountain passes) away from the Centeno-Schultz clinic, I was staying with my mom for the duration of my treatment. I was not about to mess this up by spending three or four hours in the car before and after treatments.
Hydrangeas from my team at work. Gorgeous surprise!
Turns out, it was a good thing I had an extra week to recover, because I was very sore from my reinject. Much more sore than my marrow draw, which I had not expected at all. I spent the week working from the couch, eating ice cream (again, awesomest friends. ever), and sleeping a ton. If anyone was wondering, my mom makes a GREAT in-home nurse. She took amazing care of me. She also put up with me, which I hear is no easy feat.
I just want to clarify a few things, and then I will wrap this up. Did the reinject hurt? Yes, a whole lot. Would I do it again? Absolutely. If this makes me feel better, a few days of horrible pain is more than worth it to get rid of a few years of pain every day. Especially considering the alternative of surgery. Regenexx is an outpatient procedure with relatively little recovery time. Compared to a big inpatient procedure like a fusion, which has months of recovery, this was easy. The success rate is high, and I am extremely hopeful. The amount of money we spent is nothing compared to getting my life back.
My mom and I share a love of Tulips. Beautiful!
{ 10 comments… read them below or add one }
Erin, even after hearing about all of this from you when it happened, it is still amazing to read about how much you went through. We were happy to be there to do what (little) we could.
Bree, you ladies have no idea how much you did for me! You kept me company, and more importantly, sane!! I am so lucky to have you, and to have had you close by during such an ordeal. I am so grateful to be so lucky
you are the bestest best friends ever!
Say it once, say it a thousand times – the fact that you can go through this and crack jokes really tells us something about how awesome you are. Still have my fingers crossed for you (and toes and eyes – who needs perfect vision anyway?)
BTW – from one impatient person to another – you did way better than i would have – i tend to punch when im hurty
PS LOVE YOUR THESIS THEME!!
Aww, Carrie, you are too sweet! (and the fact that you are willing to give up vision for me, well, that just makes me feel special.)
I punch too. And whine. And pout. Oh, and there’s the eating…
I LOVE MY THESIS THEME TOO!! (Now if I could just figure out how to work all the cool stuff on here, we’d be in business!)
So, what is the next step? Any suggestions from their office as to progression?
How’s the back coming along since the procedure? I am considering this as well.
SHP~
My activity level has increased a lot. Although I still have pain every day, I feel that I am managing it much more effectively. I’m hoping that it will continue to get better in the next several months, as that is when I was told to expect to see the results from all of this! I’ll for sure keep you posted!
Erin
Pretty nice post. I just stumbled upon your blog and wanted to say that I have really enjoyed browsing your blog posts. In any case I’ll be subscribing to your feed and I hope you write again soon!
What a great resource!