The Journey to Surgery
In my last post I wrote about how I fell down the stairs the day after I was dumped hardcore by my boyfriend and hurt my left shoulder...well it took a couple months to get surgery...this is the journey to it...
So its been almost 8 months since I posted on here...which SUCKS but I've had a ton of stuff going on since September....this is only the half of it....
For those who didn't read my last post I wrote how after falling down my basement stairs and my front porch steps, I had torn my labrum and rotator cuff in my left shoulder. I was put on light duty at work, so 3 days a week at work instead of the normal 5. I also wrote about how Dr.Ticker refused to do the surgery on my shoulder because he didn't think it would "do the trick", yet when I tore my labrum in my right shoulder getting surgery was the trick to fixing it. He wanted me to get physical therapy and after 5 weeks of it, it did NOTHING, I was clearly getting PT from the wrong people, so that's basically what happened with the first doctor...
I went to go see a second doctor to see if he would do the surgery and he knew the type of injury I had so he was willing to see what he could do...he said that he only did anterior labrum repairs not posterior labrum repairs. Side note...the difference between anterior and posterior labrum tears is that anterior is the front of the shoulder and the posterior is the back of the shoulder...I was there for about like 10 minutes, a total waste of time.
I decided to go see a different doctor at a different location then where Dr. Ticker is located...honestly the surgeons at Orlin and Cohen...at least the ones I dealt with are serious A+ ass hats. This doctor was even worse than Ticker. At this point in my life things were a mes. My seizures weren't controlled, I was stressed beyond belief, it was starting to seem like no surgeon would help me and I was genuinely losing all hope for my left shoulder to get better. So anyway, this doctor said he wouldn't do any type of surgery unless I was 6 months seizure free. I asked him if it was a family member who was hurt and couldn't function properly and had epilepsy if he would do it...he said he would make them wait 6 months also and that "its just something epileptics have to deal with, that's the reality of it". I was like "oh is that so? just because I have a condition I have zero control over, you refuse to do surgery when I really need it?" He then again said that its just something epileptics and people who have seizure conditions have to deal with. I looked at my dad after he said that to me and my dad knew to get me out of that office before I punched this dude in the face.
At this point I was so unbelievably desperate I called Ticker, begging him to do the surgery...he of course said no he will not help me. I was devastated that nobody would help me. I was in so much pain and it started to put me into a depression. It got bad.
I then went and saw another doctor who JACKPOT decided he would help me. I was so stoked, the surgery was scheduled. I got permission from my doctor saying I could be put under anesthesia. Then while I was in the city on a Friday I get a phone call from an anesthesiologist who would be putting me under on that Monday for the surgery. He said that he needed more information about my condition from my neurologist but he can't get in touch with him. I was like well you're calling me after 5 on a Friday telling me this when I won't be able to get in touch with my doctor until Monday, the day I get surgery, are you effing kidding me? I was FURIOUS. I was like screaming on the phone in the middle of central park while hanging out with a coworkers friends who I just met, they probably thought I was a crazy person. The person on the phone kept telling me to calm down and talk in a normal voice. He said if I don't stop yelling he will hang up. I was like so basically you are telling me you won't give me what I NEED until you get my life story of epilepsy, he said yes we need more information, so he cancelled my surgery. I had to then call my doctor that Monday and explain to him the things the anesthesiologist told me he needed to send over. My doctor sent over multiple documents saying I could be put under general anesthesia and how long I've had epilepsy, when my last seizure was...all that stuff. I then got my surgery rescheduled. A couple days later I got a phone call from the surgeon himself.He said that even with all the information my doctor sent over HE didn't want to do the surgery because it would need to be done in a hospital (which is didn't...the anesthesiologists just STILL did not feel comfortable) So this surgeon told me that he doesn't do minor surgeries in the hospital, only does major surgeries. I begged him to make an exception...he just kept saying how this happens sometimes, and if I don't have a team that feels comfortable to do it at a medical center then I doesn't feel comfortable either. So I had 2 surgeries that were canceled, just because I have epilepsy. I went into the bathroom at work for a good 20 minutes sat on the floor and broke down. At this point I lost ALL hope.
When I cry, you can tell that I cried. My face gets all red, especially my nose and eyebrows. A coworker saw me and pulled me into his office asking me what was wrong. I told him what had happened then he told me his son had to get shoulder surgery and gave me the name of the surgeon that helped his son.
I took my coworkers advice and went to see this surgeon. Before I went to see him I googled him and saw his credentials before I wasted more of my time. Anyway, so the surgeon came into the room, he saw my MRI and was like why haven't you gotten surgery? You need it!...I said the surgeons I saw didn't want to do surgery because they didn't want to take any sort of risk with an epileptic. So he said to me, I will go over the risks with you and if you're okay with it, I'm okay with it and I promise you, I will not cancel on you or give up. I wanted to give him a really big hug, I finally found a surgeon that would and wanted to help me. So we scheduled the surgery for the Tuesday after Thanksgiving. So that Tuesday comes along, my dad takes me to the location where he does surgery and got all ready to get it done. So I go in the room and less than 2 hours later, I was done. The surgeon came in, went over what he did.He put 3 anchors in my left shoulder and told me I need to rest it and start getting physical therapy about a month after surgery. He said that the surgery went better than he expected and it was a great success.