new and scared

Hi scaredwayne,

Perhaps I'm the wrong one to respond first-up as I personally don't have a SCI or have fused disks, but I have had to develop a lot of know-how since my daughters injury.

You don't say what level your injury is, but from your comments, I'd assume it's in the lumbar spine, or maybe the thoracic spine, given your mention of bladder & bowel.

Although the thought of any surgery is scary, and especially spinal surgery, I'd imaging that you've had opinion of at least a couple of specialists to have reached this point. Fusion of disks isn't unusual and has been quite successful in many cases, especially where a nerve has been compressed between vertebrae.

I'll leave it to others to discuss their personal experiences and to give you reassurance and hopefully, in the near future, we'll see scaredwayne become recoveredwayne.

Best wishes.

still in the finding out mode and its going at a snails pace at that the longer it takes to get some place the more it scares me I am so scared I am going to end up in a chair and it scares the life out of me am not sure how to tackle this fear and would really like to hear from others the frayd spinal cord part is the most scary as its already has my bladder bowels messed up can not hold them at all and no feeling of fullness or need to go they just go at their will

All I can say mate is good luck with it and remember that we are all here to help and support you  

Welcome to the forum!  Yes, it is scary for each of us, and it can be disheartening at times.  Especially the B&B management...  Have you checked out the forum for this issue?  www.inspiredsciforum.com/board/3/bowel-bladder  Maybe the surgery will put you on the road to recovery from this.  And if you do wind up in a chair, you will learn to cope as many of us have had to do.  Good to have support of those with more experience!