Microdisectomy: One week post op

Alright people, a week is up and so far its good news.

Sciatic pain: he says its mostly gone. Today he started feeling the fathom pains that everyone talk about. Thank god I knew what it was because he was freaking out a bit. He says it feels similar to sciatic, but not quite. The pain is not intense, just kinda there and kinda uncomfortable. No tingling, but mostly just there. Thankfully it comes and goes. Now we just hope the frequency goes down as the months continue.

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Incision/back pain: It was way stronger for him than we anticipated. His pain tolerance is pretty high so it was surprising. He took 2 pills of Hydrocodone every 4 hours for the first 4 days. We are now down to one pill every 4 hours, but hopefully that will keep decreasing. This Ice pack works really well for us and they make another one that you can put across your waist.

Friday he pushed it hard. We had family over for dinner and he sat for a whole hour and was out of bed for a total of 3 hours. It was way too long for both and he paid the consequences. He felt his sciatic pain come back for the first time since the surgery. It lasted the whole night, the pain was less intense than usual, and I was able to let him know it was probably hi over doing it and the inflammation. At least he learned the hard way to take it easy. The sciatic pain went away the next day and has thankfully not come back.

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Constipation: Okay this has been the most annoying part so far this week. We have gotten soooo many different opinions about how to deal with constipation cause by opioids. We tried multiple things and we are still trying to figure out exactly what works for him. The one thing I know for sure doesn't work is tons of extra fiber. It caused more pressure and it didn't help at all.

Right now we are trying prune juice, colace 3 times a day and veggies. On day 4 we had to use a glycerin suppository which luckily worked like magic. Its amazing, easy to use, it wasn't like a violent and it didn't give him stomach issues. From my understanding, its a bit less hard than a laxative. We might have to use another one tomorrow if he doesn't have another full bowel movement soon.

So far, things have gone really well. He is walking at least 4 times a day doing laps around the house, he is able to sit down for meals starting day 5 (short 15 mins) but is still not the most comfortable but its really cool to see him doing better. He is getting stronger every day. He is taking one more week completely off and then going back to work from home after. I'm taking one more week.

I definitely would recommend to take two weeks off if you can afford it or have the pto. I'm really grateful I'm still here and truthfully I needed a bit of a break from taking care of him for the last 4 months. Its been a fairly taxing time for both of us, but of course him way more.

Past posts:

Day of OP here: https://www.reddit.com/r/Sciatica/comments/arsvuy/night_before_the_microdisectomy/

2 days post op: https://www.reddit.com/r/Sciatica/comments/aszc9x/microdisectomy_2_days_post_op/

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