Doing Great; Exercising and Getting in Shape
I had another post op appointment this past week. I am really happy about my progress and so is Dr. Tyagi. She can really see that my balance has improved, I'm healing very well and getting my stamina back. When she asked me what percentage I thought I was up to in my Chiari recovery I said 75-80%, which seemed to make her very happy. I do still have facial numbness and a bit of swelling, although it is not the same as before the surgery. Dr. Tyagi wants me to return in April since I do still have these symptoms and possibly do a MRI. She said that we really need to give it a year since the nerves had been compressed for so long it may take a really long time to recover. After seeing Dr. Tyagi last week I had about 4 days that I didn't have any symptoms at all; the numbness and swelling was gone in my face...it felt great! To me my face looks really different when I don't have all that inflammation from the nerves being aggravated. I'm really hopeful that my nerves will calm down permanently, but yesterday and today it's back. I have had a bit of a headache the last two days and not feeling great. It almost seems like I have a bit of a bug...we'll see; it doesn't seem as if it's just Chiari symptoms.
So in the meantime, I have been really pushing myself to get in shape since I have the time and I'm feeling so good now. I'm going to the gym most weekdays running 3 1/2 miles on the elliptical in 40 minutes. I started adding a weight workout 2 weeks ago. We'll be going to Colorado to see Bree & Dean and ski in March, so it will be good to be in shape a little bit at least.
I was buying some new furniture this week and talking to the saleswoman. Her 15 year old daughter has had 3 surgeries for Chiari. What a surprise to hear when such a short time ago I had never even heard of Chiari.
