Okay. Hi my name is Michelle. I had scoliosis since 2005.
I'm in grade 13. And after I plan on doing fashion merchandising and
marketing. Oh when I had scoliosis. When I first found out about it I was excited
because it was something new and different, and no one else had it but me
so I was kind of excited because I felt special. I didn't really know what it was.
It just seemed kind of like exciting and new. When I found out I had to have
surgery it was kind of weird because I never really had surgery before, but then
I was excited because I always wanted to know what surgery felt like and I never
really been in a hospital, so when they said oh you have to have surgery I was
just like "Okay, let's do it". When we decided. Well I
actually decided to have surgery as soon as the doctor told me, because I just
wanted to do it and see what it felt like. But my parents were a little
nervous, so I just kind of talked to them about it and just said "Well, you know,
it's better for me if I do it ." And I was on board as soon as he said it, so I was
just just waiting for it to come. I think my parents biggest concern was my health
and if I would make it through or not. But I was really nervous about that
because I knew. So I think they were just more concerned about my health. I think
one of our major concerns during, or before surgery, was that she was going
to go through the surgery and come out still as Michelle. That there was going to
be no hiccups. That the surgery would go well. Working with the spinal column, I
mean anything can happen to her, and we just wanted. I guess we just anticipated
and felt what if something happened to her during surgery where she wasn't
going to be the same kid coming in. But fortunately she sailed through the
surgery and she's Michelle.Take advice. Don't anticipate that something will
happen because chances it will not. Just take each day at a time.
Listen to your doctor. Listen to your son or daughter and you'll sail through
without any issues. Yeah I would have surgery again if I had to go back.
Um, just because it wasn't a big of a deal kind of. It was just. Like I knew it's for
my health, so I had to do it and I would do it again. It was fun. It wasn't as bad
as everyone thinks. After the surgery I felt crooked even though I was straight.
Because when I was crooked. No. Okay. I felt straight when I was crooked and
then when I was straight I felt crooked. You were crooked when you were straight
and you were straight when you were crooked. Even though I was straight, I felt crooked
because I was so used to being crooked that I felt straight. Um, I felt crooked
but I really was straight, so that was really weird. I felt lopsided.
That feeling lasted for about a couple weeks until I
actually had to like think and it was like more of a like a mental thing to
realize that oh like my body's actually straight, so I had to think about it
first before I could actually like feel it. So it's kind of more of a mental
thing in my head that I had to get over. The worst thing about being in the
hospital was lying on that bed doing nothing.
That was the worst part because I couldn't couldn't get up when I wanted
to and I couldn't move and everything in me and the drugs. Yeah, that was pretty
funny. So. Ugh. Yeah. The good thing about it was
being taken care of so I didn't have to do anything. I could complain as much as
I wanted, so. It was a week of pampering. Yeah. A week of pampering for me. How fast
I got out of there was actually a surprise. And just like how friendly the
doctors and the nurses were. I didn't think they would be that friendly
because I know I wouldn't if I was getting up and dealing with all these
patients. But they were actually pretty friendly and good to talk to. On a scale
of one to ten when I first woke up? The pain was like a zero, because I
couldn't really feel anything and I was on so much drugs that it didn't. I was
just lying there and just looking at everybody I didn't feel anything.
A couple days later when I was still in the hospital, the pain on a scale of one
to ten was about a three or four just because I was still like on medication.
But like after a few days the pain went away and away and away and I didn't have
to take any medication, so I was feeling good, I was happy. The pain number when I
was home was like whoa! Like, oh it was like five, six, seven just cause I didn't
have like the medication that I had when I was at the hospital. So when I was at
home it was more like Tylenol and that eventually that wouldn't work anymore so
it just had to deal with it, with what I was given. So before the pain
settled down it took about a couple of months probably the end of summer, but
then when I went back to school it started all over again. Carrying books
and just walking around and sitting down. But again I took Tylenol, so that kind of
relieved it. So I just kind of got used to like the pain I was dealt with. It was.
It probably went down after a couple of months to like a one.
Today I basically have no pain. It's just like everyone else like when they lift
something heavy that's the pain I have, or like. Yeah. Pretty much just lifting
something heavy or doing something that I don't normally do. But other than that
I have no pain like in my spine or anything. I had to rely on my parents is good
because they were always there, but then when they went to work and just kind of
left me at home with my sister, she was help but I just kind of wanted to do
things on my own so I didn't really like to rely on people. But when I had to they
were always there, so I always knew that if I couldn't do something then they
would do it. After Michelle had the surgery and was in the hospital I didn't
treat her as if she had a major back surgery. Like we got her up out of bed. We
got her mobile. We were home in a record six days. When we got her home,
unfortunately my husband and I had to go back to work. We were a little hesitant,
but we said "Okay Michelle. You have any problems you can get a hold of us on
our cells. We'll be home in five minutes". I'll have to say because we got Michelle
so mobile before she left the hospital, it helped her healing process fast
enough remarkably. She did a lot of sleeping
after. She was on a lot of medication, Tylenol or whatever the doctors had
given us, a little bit of morphine if the pain got too intense. But she knew what
she could do with her body. We felt that she was a young adult, if
she had any issues she would let somebody know.She was up, she was
swimming. She wasn't doing it intensely, but she was out floating in the water
shortly after surgery, which helped the recovery time and healing. Moms or dads,
just treat her like she's the same kid because she's gonna she's going to heal.