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Brian Enos's Forums... Maku mozo!

boba

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Posts posted by boba

  1. Sorry for your troubles! I have some words of advice on physical therapy: DO IT!

    Yes, it hurts and yes it's no fun. No, you may not see any gain - for days weeks or even months. But eventually, it will help!!

    Most insurance companies only cover enough therapy to get you mobile again. When the insurance runs out, join a gym/health club and keep working out. If money is a problem, try your local high school - some let people use their equipment and are very reasonable. I was involved in a "whoops" 7 years ago. I go to Planet Fitness (shameless plug). They only charge $10 a month and are open 24 hours a day during the week. If moderate work outs causes pain - talk to your doctor. They started me out on a 'cocktail' of vicodin, ibuprofen, and oxycontin so I endure the pain of just lifting my arm. I still take a mild dose of vicodin an hour before each work out. My arm is actually much stronger than before the accident, although my range of motion remains limited. Without PT, it would be useless.

    Good luck, and God Bless!

    Hi Tom, I did PT for 8 weeks before surgery and am looking forward to getting back to it. I go for a recheck in 4 weeks and the surgeon will decide then if I can return to work and start PT. He mentioned 12 weeks of PT. Right now the pain in my arms is almost nothing and it sure feels good.

  2. Just thought I would updated this old thread. After months of PT, Spinal injections and lots of narcotics, surgery was done on 1/19. The herniated disk was removed and a cadaver bone was used to make up the space. I also have a metal plated screwed between the c5-c6 and a bone has been grafted over that. For the first time in months the arm pain is almost gone, I still have weakness in the right arm which may or may not return. I am looking forward to getting ready to shoot this seasons IPDA and USPSA local matches. It's going to feel good getting back into the swing of things. I have about 4 weeks I have to lay low and then back to work and more PT.

  3. Everyone thanks for the encouraging words and advise. Today the pain level is around a 2 and the unit seems to help. I have been working (I am a programmer). Sitting had been very painful and after the first couple of hours at the computer the pain gets to be a 8 - 9 even if I get up every 20 minutes or so. I just got a call from EMPI (manufacturere of the TENS unit I have) and they said that my Health Insurance would cover it less the deductible. This was a WC covered injury so now they have to go back to the WC for authorization. I will find out next week. PT has been very light so far due to the pain and muscle tension. Their goal behind the neck injection and this TENS unit is to get me to the point PT can actually work on me. The nuerosurgeon said that if I am not showing improvement after 30 days of PT then he is suggesting surgery. I plan on going to U of M for a second opinion and have them do the surgery if it comes to that.

    Thanks again everyone.

    Bob

  4. Hi gang, I am finally in PT and had my first neck injection today. It's been about 6 hours and the pain is getting worse again. Yesterday I got a TENS unit for the PT people and it does help some and keeps me for using the Narcotics so much. Pain pills and muscle relaxers are not my choice of pain control and hopefully this will get me through the worse pain times. Anyway have any of you used the"TENS" as a long term pain control (IE 6 + months)?

    BTW the unit I have is a Empi Select.

  5. We don't always have 'perfect' falls here, either; but this year has been rare and nice. No big storms yet (plenty cool at night, but that sometimes turns the leave quickly), but just this long, gradual slide into late fall and lots of color this time around.

    This particular tree will go thru a couple or three stages of turning leaf. The photos happened over today and yesterday (and it actually changed a lot since yesterday, due to overnight lows of 30-32). I'll post the tree in decline over the next coming week or three, so you can see where it goes when it's on the way out. Unless it pours rain, of course. But the weathercast for this week is continued calm and sunny. It's going to be a great fall in Eugene.

    Enjoy and thanks for sharing with those of us not so fortunate this year. :cheers:

  6. Very Nice. I am jealous. Seems we never get really good fall colors here in northern california.

    I miss that from back east where I grew up :( Fall used to be my favorite season!

    Fall is my favorite time of the year also. I love the smell and cooler temps and the colors. It just doesn't seem to last as long as it use to. Lately we have been going right to the freezing temps.

  7. Rock on Dan :) Have you fixed your sights yet? I know that was holding you back last month.

    Dan my hat is off to you and stick with your plan. I am also going to start a diary and like you there is a high possibility that I won't be able to stick to all the time. Like you have already stated I believe that the secret will be to not get discouraged about progress or the lack of time for the training planned.

  8. I herniated L5/S1 riding around northern Iraq in a vehicle with less than ideal suspension and decked out in body armor laden with way too much ammo, radios, camelbak, etc.

    Opted for microdiscetomy and havent regretted it a minute. Incision was about 3/4 of an inch, and I walked out of the hospital the same day, in at 8am, out at 5pm.

    It really depends on exactly how bad your herniation is....if the "extruded" spongy material that has escaped from its sheath (the herniation) is pressing on a nerve, no amount of core strengthening is going to push the extruded material back in place and every day that the material pushes against a nerve, you risk long term damage to that nerve.

    I would read ALOT about ruptured, herniated, slipped, extruded (all basically the same thing) discs then have a very detailed discussion with the knifeman IMO.

    In 1988 I laid in traction in the hospital getting morphine shots every 3 hours. I had herniated the disk between the L5-S1 and the plan at that time was to be in traction for 7 days then PT until I got better. On the 4th day my bladder was no longer working and they decided to do surgery the next day. Less that 24 hours later I was going home, I took only asprin for a few days after the surgery. I was one of the lucky ones. The herniation I have now is out of it's casing and against the nerves. I have all the normal arm pain, numbness, hand tingling, burning in my neck plus the headache and my vision is effected. I will go the route of no surgery if I can avoid it. I should hear tomorrow when I go to the Neurosurgeon.

    Edited to add thank you for serving.

  9. I have a set of electonic ear muffs made by Peltor. They are grey in color and have a receiver on each side and good amplification and if memory serves me they are about 9 years old.... but I bought them as a close out discontinued item so who knows when they were manufactured.

    They have been worn many hundreds of times including shooting matches.... running my chain saw... hunting...teaching pistol classes etc. They have been drowned.... frozen.... baked... soaked in mud....and generally mistreated.

    Last month following two days outside in the pouring rain at the MI state IDPA match.... both ear piece cups started splitting and the foam was just hanging out of the cracks. Finding that I couldn't repair them...I started pricing them out and soon found it would cost me around $200 to replace them with a new set with the same features... so just for the heck of it I called Peltor. They are a huge international company so I didn't think I'd get much help.

    The unit is so old that the model number is worn off the side and the serial number was so faded that it couldn't be read. The customer service rep. patiently asked me lots of questions about the unit ...color... where the batteries were located... what kind of battery.. what is inside the ear piece ...discription of the head band etc.

    At then end of this effort she concluded which model I had and advised me that since I had told her I was a pistol instructor that I must be "one of the good guys" so she was going to ship me TWO complete sets of ear muff cups along with new foam liners for the muffs ( so that if I had further problems I would have the repair parts on hand).... free of charge and that they would go out by UPS tonight.

    WOW .... GREAT SERVICE FROM A U. S. BASED SERVICE REP. WHO SPOKE PERFECT ENGLISH.... TWO SETS OF FREE PARTS AND FREE SHIPPING.

    Remember the name Peltor!!!!!!!!!!!!

    Wow, a company that actually doesn't believe in a throw-away society. :cheers: That's great you were able to save your investment. Says a lot for the way things use to always be.

  10. I blew out the discs between C6/C7 and C7/T1. I also broke the parts that interlock between C7 and T1. I went for almost a full year before getting it fixed. I still have some loss of dexterity in my right hand and numbness when my head is turned the wrong way. Can the herniation be repaired or is it completely blown out the way mine was?

    The only good part is that when they crammed cadaver bone fragments in to regain the proper spacing between the vertebrae, it made me 7mm taller! :)

    MyNeck.jpg

    Mike, I haven't seen the neurosurgeon yet. The workman's comp doctor will call me once it gets scheduled. I guess they have to get clearance from the carrier first. Hopefully it won't be long.

  11. Well, I got my MRI results back today, I have two herniated disks C5-C6 and C6-C7. That explains why I was getting worse instead of better. I have gone from no-restrictions, do what you can tolerate to no lifting, pushing, shoving....etc. I actually got feeling better and had a couple of good days, just dull pain (that's when I took the video of my shooting). Sunday the pain instead of being dull came back with a vengance and I am living on the Lortabs for pain right now. The workmans comp doc is scheduling an appointment with a neurosurgeon this week. I am confident I will be back to full speed soon though and am ready to get back to work and life as I know it.

  12. Seeing isn't really about going fast or slow. It's about seeing.

    Flexmoney I am still trying to grasp that concept and once I get Brians book maybe that will help. Right now I haven't had the time to dedicate to a daily routine. I was lucky if I got to actually study and practice once a week and I know that I need to at least starting out do something everyday. Work has gotten back to a normal pace for now and I will be putting together a daily practice routine to follow. Right now I don't see that fast, if that makes sense. And I am not sure that I am really seeing at all in the sense that you are talking about. I actually got those double tap splits down as low as .16 a couple of times at 7 yards and I can tell you for sure that I didn't actually see, it was more of an a feeling that everything was lined up and good to go (trusting my instinct). I have to run for now and maybe I can explain this better later.

  13. My splits were running between .24-.30 and at 7 yards that probably is a little slow.

    Did you see your sights lift? If you didn't, you were going too fast.

    Good question, now that I think about it the only thing I did see was the front sight when it came within the A zone. I have read about seeing the front sight lift but I have only really experienced it a couple of time so far, and it seems it was only when I going slower. Considering that 5 out of 6 were A's do you think I should always be seeing the sights lift even at 7 yards? Thanks for digging into this, I hate to go any deeper into a bad habit if that's where I am going here.

  14. All good stuff guys and thanks!!!. I don't have a camcorder so I thought I would try setting my laptop on a barrel and use it's built in cam , I think it worked pretty good for what I needed. I knew I needed refinement on draws, reloads and getting back on target. My splits were running between .24-.30 and at 7 yards that probably is a little slow. With a production gun, stock trigger and sights what do you guys think is a reasonable time to expect?

  15. Hi gang, I just started shooting last May and have shoot about 5 matches so far and have shot nearly 7000 rounds all together. This is the first time I took a video of myself and I can tell right away there are some habits I need to get rid of. One is doing the reloads closer to me and up higher and the other is the habit of bending my right knee when I draw. I took 8 videos today and this was the fastest. The rest all settled in at just over 10 seconds. I was shooting all A's and decided to see if I could speed things up a bit and this is what I got and shot 5 A's and 1 C. Feel free to pick away at it so I can learn a bit more. Right now I am not classified and I shoot USPSA Production.

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