I. Can't. Move. Literally. :( I threw out my back again. July of 2005 I did the same thing and was told it was a bulging disk in my lower back and sciatica. My torso, hips and legs looked like the letter S. I couldn't stand up straight and couldn't walk. Well, I did SOMETHING yesterday and now I'm in the same boat. I went to the doctor yesterday afternoon and he gave me an adjustment... but he warned me this would happen - that what he did would temporarily inflame the muscles and make it worse. That's an understatement. Do you know how absolutely frustrating it is to have two children under the age of two who NEED me and I can't even pick them up??? Jillian is only 12 lbs, for God's sake, and I can't pick her up. I have to hold on to walls or crawl to get anywhere. The doctor said that he's not surprised that I'm going through this now... I guess there's this hormone, relaxin, that goes through your system when you're pregnant. It relaxes the joints and muscles in your body in preparation for childbirth. That's why I had little to no back pain when I was pregnant. But now that those hormones are leaving my system, my muscles are tightening up again.
I have no idea what I'm going to do when Mark goes back to work on Tuesday. :( Hopefully I'll be a little better by then. I've been hopping myself up on anti-infammatories and muscle relaxers and putting moist heating pads on my back... hopefully that'll all work. Otherwise I'm screwed.
On top of that, we discovered that our new insurance doesn't cover Jillian's formula - which is freakin' expensive... and Matt has a head cold.
Jillian is doing a lot better... call me gimicky (what with the swaddle blanket and all), but I started reading this book called The Baby Whisperer, and it's amazing the differences we're seeing in Jillian! It promotes a schedule (well, more of a routine, actually) called E.A.S.Y. Eat, Awake, Sleep/You time. E.A.S.Y. is basically learning your baby's cues and kind of letting her/him fall into their own cycle/schedule. That way you're not mistaking hungry cues for tired cues, kwim? It's working pretty well for us so far. I'm learning to differentiate her cries and body language to tell when she's tired, hungry, bored, gassy, etc. It sounds like a no-brainer, but it's actually hard to tell what is what without a little practice. Since I started implementing E.A.S.Y, I've actually been able to get her to nap in her crib during the day for up to 2 1/2 hours, and her mood has drastically improved. Putting her to bed is even fairly easy (no pun intended!).
Here's a little video of Matt singing "Twinkle Twinkle." :) Enjoy!
3 comments:
I'm sorry about your back pain! I can't even imagine. I thought I had bad back pain since we started using a crappy mattress - but yours sounds 1000 times worse! (Btw - we are getting a new mattress today - yay!)
Matt's video made me laugh! "Uh Oh!"
I had severe back pain about 6 years ago. I think it was a combination of a bad mattress and rough basketball that did me in. I couldn't stand up hardly at all and when the doctor had me try physical therapy, it only got worse. It wasn't getting better and the sciatica was causing numbness in my legs (not just pain) which he said could become permanent if not treated. So I went under the knife. I think the procedure was called a leminectomy, where they remove part of the bulging disk. After being on my back for two weeks I was able to get up and walk around a few hours after my surgery! Everythning has been good since. Hopefully your doctor can find a solution.
As Brian said, Kelly, we totally understand the back thing. Although fortunatley we didn't have kids at the time. That was the longest month... oh, and to clarify Brian's comment, they removed the part of his vertebrae (called the lamina) as well as the bulge in the disk. It was instant relief for him. I hope that things turn around before Mark goes back to work!
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