Category: Larry

The adhesive tape fell off today so here are the photos that I promised. It looks kind of gross but everything feels pretty normal (normal but still numb that is).

I briefly mentioned in a comment on Steve’s Battle Creek post that I was having wrist surgery. Here’s a follow up with more details.

I’ve mentioned before that I’ve had numbness in my right ring and pinky fingers for over six months. I first noticed it sometime after my pneumonia bout. I wasn’t sure if the numbness perfectly coincided with the pneumonia or not because there was enough other things bothering me that a little finger problem was easily overlooked by me.

At some point in the process of regaining my health, I noticed the numbness. At first I thought it was from spending too much time on my computer – since that’s about all I could do (I was thinking carpal tunnel syndrome but it turns out carpal tunnel affects the other fingers). I tried a couple of home remedies but they didn’t work. At my two month checkup with my doc, I mentioned the problem. He diagnosed it as probably ulnar tunnel entrapment (he was dead on there).

It turns out that there are three likely spots that the ulnar nerve can get entrapped – the wrist, the elbow and the neck:

My doc said that the rapid weight loss that I had could have caused some things to shift around and caused the nerve to get pinched up by my elbow (turns out he was off on the location). He said to wait until I gained the weight back to see if it would go away. If it didn’t he’d send me to a specialist.

Well it didn’t go away, so he arranged some additional tests. I had an EMG (Electromyography) where they stuck a punch of pins and needles in me to run an electric shock up and down the nerve path to figure out what was getting through to where.

The EMG showed that the problem was in my wrist which was a little unusual in that most times the blockage occurs at the elbow. In a way that was good news because it’s a lot easier to get at the nerve in the wrist than it is anywhere else. The bad news was that physical therapy can’t do much for the wrist problem and surgery is pretty much the only course (waiting it out to just hope it goes away is another).

So I went off to see an orthopedic surgeon who confirmed the diagnosis and scheduled the surgery. BTW – my surgery was done by Paul Suhey, the brother of longtime Chicago Bear running back Matt Suhey. The operation was Tuesday a week ago. Basically, what they do is to partially cut the ligament that’s causing the pressure on the nerve. Scar tissue will eventually fill in the gap in the ligament but it should reduce the tension in the ligament enough that the pressure will no longer be on the nerve and it will regrow.

Unfortunately, the regrowth is a long process. The doc said the nerve will probably regenerate at a pace of about 1mm per day. Since I’ve got about 5-6 inches of affected nerve that means it could take 5 months or so to completely heal (1 inch equals 25.4 mm, so 6 inches would be 152 days).

The surgery was done on an outpatient basis and I was conscious the whole time (although they didn’t let me watch the actually cutting of the wrist). It was kind of weird because I could feel him doing something down there but there was no pain involved.

The whole procedure only took about 10-15 minutes and I was good to go. They wrapped my wrist up in kind of a brace and sent me off. I had some oxycodone as a pain killer but only took that for a couple of days. I basically had no restrictions in what I could do. The doc basically said that the brace will prevent me from doing anything that could actually damage the wrist. His quote was “If you can do it, it’s ok to do it”.

Here’s a little video of what I’m walking around with at the moment.

Just got an email from Lisa on an unrelated subject and she asked how I was feeling which made me realize it’s probably time for an update.

As I told her, I still have some minor issues but am getting better.  Specifically, I have four issues, only one of which even concerns me in the slightest.

The first issue is my endurance.  I basically have none and am easily winded.  Once the weather turns nicer, I’ll start going for walks/runs and that should fix it.

The second is my strength (or lack there of).  It’s really amazing how much strength I’ve lost.  A week or so ago I decided to see how many push-ups I could do (actually, to be honest, I wanted to see if I could do ONE).  I got in a push-up position and quickly realize that if I were to try to lower myself, I crash onto my face.  So not only can’t I do a push-up, I can’t even do a lower-down.  My doc suggested that I join a gym and start lifting weights.  I’m not a big fan of gyms but I might have to take him up on his suggestion.

The third issue is one that I think that I have mentioned before.  I have a numbness in my ring and pinky fingers on my right hand (it feels just like a permanent hit on the funny bone).  At first I thought it might be carpal tunnel syndrome from sitting at my computer too much but a little internet research uncovered that carpal tunnel never affects those fingers, it’s the other three that are impacted.  My doc gave it a fancy name, which I forget, but it’s basically a nerve in my elbow that’s getting squeezed or pinched.  He said that what’s most likely is that all the sudden weight loss has caused things to shift around in my body and undoubtedly something is pinching the nerve.  He said to give it a few months to see if I put the weight back on, which probably would fix it, or to see if things naturally shift again.  If it doesn’t clear up on it’s own, he said he’d send me to a neuro guy who should be able to quickly fix it with minor surgery. It’s been a month and nothing’s yet happened (my weight is 175 so I’m keeping it down).  I’ll give it another month or so before I make arrangements to have it checked out.    

The fourth thing is the only one that I’m not sure what’s happening.  There’s something fishy going on around my lower right rib cage.  It’s like I have a muscle pull or something.  Occasionally, I’ll make a sharp turn with my body, or rollover in bed, or take a sharp deep breath, and I’ll feel a slight stabbing pain. Actually, pain is probably too strong a word. It’s more like a discomfort.  If it’s just a muscle pull like I think, it should heal up on it’s own so I’m just going to wait a while before I do anything about it.  

Other than that, everything is fine.  No more coughing at all which is the real good news.  Everything else appears to be just a matter of time coupled with a little effort on my part.

Really had a good week.  This is the first week where I’ve pretty much been able to do almost whatever I want without having any issues. I got winded on Monday scraping the snow and ice off of my car but didn’t break into a coughing fit despite the cold weather.

I spent most of the week at Tom’s house and was able to carry on conversations with him all week without them turning into a bunch of coughs – that was a first too. 

I was out shopping this afternoon wandering around stores for about three hours without an issue – usually one trip around a store will wear me out but I walked all through Target, WalMart, and Best Buy without a problem.

I’m targeting New Year’s Eve as the rebirth of my social life.  My favorite band, JR and Natalie, are playing at a local bar and I’m going to head there for the night (after my obligatory stop at the Tavern).