Surgery

March 22, 2010: Today I went in to surgery at 8:00 AM. I was asleep before the surgical room. They couldn't find a vein for the IV until after four tries. Surgery took 5 hours. Recovery room was for 2 hours. The doctor said that everything went perfect. There were two incisions for the surgery. A small one on my right side. It was through this that the doctor inserted an artificial peace of cartilage between my L4 and L5 vertebrae. I was then rolled onto my stomach while under anesthesia and the main 4 inch incision was made in the center of my back over the L4/L5 area. It was through this incision that the doctor cleaned out my spinal canal to correct a major restriction in the spinal cord. This restriction was causing pain to occur in my right leg for the last six months on an ever increasing basis. Following the cleaning, the doctor connected my L4 and L5 vertebrae with two screws and a rod all made out of titanium. This has put my spine back in alignment without restrictions in the spinal cord. The basic problem was that my L5 vertebrae was not in alignment and you could actually see the difference in x-rays when I stood straight and bent over that the vertebrae was moving. This action was causing the body to react and put down bone spurs to try to strengthen the area. Unfortunately, some of these were in the spinal canal area and caused the pinching or restriction of the cord. With the artificial cartilage inserted in the front and the screws and rod now in the back, my spine is now back in alignment and not loose anymore. The doctor is predicted that tomorrow the pain in my legs will be gone. He is also predicting that my back will feel like somebody hit me in the middle of my back with a baseball bat. I know he is right on that so I am hoping when my surgery pain is over, which could take several weeks, I will be pain free.

After surgery my pain level was an 8/10 when I woke up but now that I am back in my room and on pain medication it is 2. The physical therapist came and I took a small walk around the room with pain at level 2. The doctor just came in while I was writing this and tested my leg strength. It is already stronger than before the surgery suggesting the spinal cord and nerves were repaired well. He predicted that tomorrow may be a more painful day as the local anesthetics from the surgery wear down. We will take it one day at a time.

That's today's report as transcribed by my nurse Larry.

Back surgery

All I have been doing lately is working on two more clients that I have. Tomorrow, Sunday I will be getting ready for my back surgery. In case you didn't know I will be having back surgery on 22 Mar 2010 for my L 4 & 5 disks. I will be getting a Lamenecktomy and they will be taking the calcium out of my spinal chord, grinding it up and then using it again to help to stableize the disks from moving again. I will also be getting a titainium rod with 2 screws put in through the back to help hold them in place. Hopefully I will come out and not hurt anymore.

Our first guests

Amanda and her friend are here tonight to use the new bathroom and guest bedroom. So, glad to have them.

As for me, I'm just doing a lot of paid lecturing which is why I put off my back surgery until 22 March 2010. Everyone can just pray for me. Right now I don't take PROZAK, EXCEDRIN, ADVIL, ALEVE, ALLEGRA, EXCEDRIN PM or any other medication for pain. Sometimes I just have to lay down for the pain to be tolerable. Standing is the worst. I'm pretty proud of myslef right now, no medications and down to a size 8. That's right, I went to get a pair of pants today since none of my pants fit anymore, and I bought a size 8. Let's see how long that lasts, at least until after surgery. I went down since I started eating clean and started at 149, now I weigh 123. Not bad for an almost 58 year old grma.

Come one, come all to Rober Taj Mahal

Welcome to the Refurbished-almost new Guest Bathroom at the Robers. Here you see it coming in the door. Notice the cute things over the cupboard doors. Notice there is no more clothes hamper, bring yourselves a Pillowcase and sew down the top about an inch, then thread a cord through, so it hangs. Notice a new washcloth ring, and no more bulky hair dryer stuff, just a holder for the hairdryer. We now have a towel rack for hand towels for after you wash your hands.

Walk in the door and turn left, you will see a new Medicine cabinet, and a new big Mirror for the wall, no more black stuff around the edges. Only the best for our guests.

Notice my cute little toothbrush holder, and holders for Q-tips and cotton pads, along with Kleenex. A matching soap dish and brand new fawcets! Only uptown here!


Turining around, notice no more wallpaper. New vents, and a real honest to goodness peg on the door to hang clothes, clothes bags or towels or what ever else you want, maybe a nightgown.

I got the photo's out of order no matter how hard I tried, but going back a step, you see the right side of the sink. Notice the new towel rack that holds the hairdryer only. And a new washcloth rack for wet washclothes after shaving. You ladies even have a hand mirror that is 5X the magnification on one side for close up.

This before looking behind the door. I've moved my cute perfume bottle shelf up here and notice another hook on the front of the door- permanently secured for anything, maybe even your Church clothes because there is still no room in the Guest room to hand anything.

Now, going into the bathroom part of the guest bath, notice new monogramed towels, with the bath mat hanging over the shower door. There is no more floor to ceiling rack for shampoos etc., now it is located on the shower door itself and you should bring your own brands of soap (I only provide Irish spring in the shower) but there is another place to place your special soap now. There is only 3 other items provided now, Cetiphil for sensitive skins, Baby shampoo for those occasions when kids take a bath in there and of course we provide Head and Shoulders. So, bring your own special shampoos and conditioners.

Next, look behind the door and you will see another hook (no more plastic) and only one towel holder, big enough for 2 bath towels. There will be 8 bath towels included in this hotel bathroom for your convience.

A full view of the towel rack.

Turning around there is now a nice towel rack behind and over the toilet. It has a candle and a bowel of sweet smellys. There will be extra towels stacked here when they all get out of the wash.

Just off to the right of the towel rack, you will notice another new vent and another towel rack (you can never have too many towel racks!

Now, the toilet, cleaned inside and out with ever imaginable chemical cleaner known to man. I did it while it was stored in the garage during the time the tile was being laid. Notice new extra toilet paper holder (only holds 2) and trash can to match the rest of the ensamble. We have a new stainless steel toilet brush. What you can't see is the the VENT is now in good working order. No more stuffyness while taking a bath or dump. New toilet paper holder too.

Now notice the new tile floor and more kleenex.

This is the new inshower shampoo holder. The shower doors have been miraculously cleaned and WD 40.
The shower is brand spanking newly cleaned.

There are a lot of other little things I didn't get in the pictures, but you will just have to come and see for yourself. All are welcome, ya'll come and see us now!

Amost all done

I've had a lot of fun planning how to decorate the new guest bathroom. Most of the work here in the house is done, we are just waiting for the big mirror to come back from Brea Glass. That will be next Wednesday.

Here's what we actually did: Tore out the bathroom carpeting in both the guest bathroom and the master bedroom. Replaced it with tile. Stripped wallpaper in Guest Bathroom and painted it. Bought all new fixtures. Replaced the sink fawcets. Replaced the big mirror in the guest Bathroom that was all black around the edges. Painted inside the cupboards (white) in the guest bathroom. Cleaned out all drawers, and under the counters. It's adorable now. Plenty of room to HANG towels, robes, bags or anything else you want in there. Then we also tore out the back patio where the cement had risin and was a tripping hazzard. It was repoured and the tiles went back in place, the entire back yard was re-grouted. We replaced the bottom row of tiles in the Master Bath Shower which were cracked with new ones. I'm not sure how much we spent, but it was sure fun to have a new, clean, organized bathroom that looks great! Now you will all have to come and visit to see it!

Kid Bath update

Today work started on the Kid/guest bathroom. New fawcets are in now. Toilet and carpet ripped out. Dad primed the inside with Kilz. You can see where Mark and Brian left their 'marks' on the floor around the toilet bowl. I really thought I taught them better than that. If their wives make them clean up around the toilets they might hit it more!

De Ja Vu

In 1990 I guess Lisa and I looked a bit alike. What do you think?

New Project

Can't I ever be just satisfied to sit around and eat Candy all day???

Well, now I have a list of Projects that need to be done.

Today, Larry gave me permission to start on the Guest Room bath. The Kids Bathroom.

As of tonight, anything that was in it, is gone, the wall paper is almost all off too. Updates as they happen will be posted.

Pain Free!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Until you have been in pain for a long time, you have no idea what a novel it is to have a pain free day. I had one of those yesterday. Boy, I cleaned up the house and did a lot of those 'little' things I had been trying to get to for months if not years! I give credit to the Lord for such a day, I have abused my body so bad throughout my lifetime, that it's surprising I'm not more crippled than I am. So, Thank you Heavenly Father for a great day!

It's also a great day because Larry came home!

Harvesting our Fruit

We have a wonderful Orange Tree, of course we live in Orange County. But they all come ripe at the same time, usually March, but with all the rain they are ready now. If we don't pick the entire tree, they just rot. So, we pick the whole tree and I make Orange Juice and replenish what we drank into the Tropicana Carton. I also make lots of lemonade to freeze and save for those hot summer days and dinner.

Happy Valentines Day

No photo's but I thought I would just make note that yesterday, Feb 13, 1010, I gave 2 lectures in San Diego and after that we were to meet Mark and Lisa and Kam at the Los Angeles Temple to watch Kam for them. Turned out poor Lisa forgot to get her Temple Recommend renewed, how everyone has checked theirs by now, so she had to stay outside the Temple with Kamden and we just sort of helped. We all went out to dinner at Islands afterward. Mark and Lisa had a couple of friends that were being sealed to each other and their children, it was really special and spiritual, even afterward when they were taking pictures. All in All, I ended up driving 8 hours yesterday, I was tired when I got home.

Spring Cleaning will lead into Summer

OK, I went to Girly's house and helped her clean it up and out. It was pretty easy compared to what I decieded to do for myself. After cleaning out her office and making it really liveable and organized, I decided it was time to do that to my office too.

I started a week ago. The hallway is packed with 'stuff'. I have thrown away 4 large brown trash bags of paper and stuff. Moved stuff around. Dusted. Vacuumed where I could. Cleaned off the book shelves, going through the books and getting rid of stuff that was out of date. I cleaned out my desk drawers. Took the doors off the closet so I can see what's in there. The doors are now stored under my bed. I'm still not done. There is so much more to do. I am afraid that it will take me until the summer to get it all done. Heaven help me to have the tenacity to complete this task!

I could sure use a few prayers!

Visiting with Lisa and John & kiddos

To tell the truth, Lisa's house wasn't dirty, just messy. We got caught up on Laundry in 1 day. We have played games with the boys, cleaned out a few closets (game cupboard was my doing). And Lisa went 'whole hog' in deep cleaning one room at a time. We still have her bedroom to go into tomorrow. Today is Sunday and we went to Church at 11:00, nice. However Beckham has his nap at that time and so it's really hard for him, so I brought him home from Church during RS and Priesthood. I fed him changed him and put him down for his nap, peace at last. My hip is bothering me today, although I have slept well on one of the kids mattresses off the bunk beds. (Thanks Caleb) Now I'm board, so maybe I will take a nap, or maybe not. I'll go do email, that should put me in a funk.

And thank you girly for changing my blog, I love it!

I really miss Larry, he truly is the love of my life and my soul mate. I sure hope his 1st
Ward Conference went well, he was trying so hard to make it good, and he worked on his talk all week. In my heart I now it went well. I will be home next Wednesday for sure.

Christmas is officially gone

As I get older, it gets harder to get it all down and put away. But how wonderful to put up my 'babies' to look at all over again. We really need a new photo of Ty. I'm off to help Lisa out a little bit, so if anyone needs me, call my cell phone.

Watch out for parked cars

You won't believe what happend to me last Friday. Larry and I went to a wedding reception at a fancy restaurant in Orange Hills. It was a long driveway up and when you got to the top, you had to valet park. So far, no problem. So many people came at the same time, they started parking 3 cars across and kept going behind lining up 3 cars across. As I started to exit the car, Larry said "Watch out for cars, honey". So, as I got out, I noticed they were still parking cars behind outs, so I closed the car door, and strode off at my normal power walk rate, when the car parked next to us (2 ft. away) opened the drives door at such a fast speed I never saw it coming. I slammed my right leg right into his car door edge and it stopped me dead in my tracks! OWWW! Now I have a black and blue mark going from my knee up to my groin on my right leg. Right snap dab in the middle too. It hurs. So, now I not only have sciatic making that leg ache all the time, I now have a matching pain going up my leg in front.

The guy was really appologetic, and it wasn't done on purpose, but it was so perfectly orchestrated to look like we had planned it. I forgave him.

It can't be ARK time again!

This is a shot from Southern California. There were many other's too because everyone seems to think we need a new Ark. I got news, The Lord said never again by water, but we had better watch out for the fires next time. Our weather is getting pretty extreme, kinda like Seattle, only harder. For now the Bishop and I are staying fairly dry and when I travel the freeways it's bizarre how everyone is driving with at least 200 feet between cars and no one moves lanes. It's rather nice to drive in.

Who says my family doesn't do GENEALOGY?

When I was a young mom, I used to feel guilty about not doing my genealogy. So I became a gatherer. I had so much pain or conceived pain in my life that I didn't think it was a good Idea to journal my life either. If I had had the technology of Blogging, that would have been different, because I would have chronolized all the cute, smart, faboulous things my chldren did. Just as two of my daughters are doing. This year Kate showed me that she could make a book of her yearly blog. I exclaimed that it would be a stellar gift for me for Christmas. It was. Then I suggested that Girly do one for her blog and give it as a gift to me too. Well, as you can see below I now have all the genealogy that my family has to give me at this time and I am in 7th Heaven!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

This is the best gift of Christmas I could get! I hope all my children will take note that I really, really like this kind of gift. Someday in the far future though I hope to pass the Family History I have done to one of them with my blessing, but until that day comes, I will be satisfied with this.

I agree with Andy Rooney

Now, I got the following in an Email. I don't know if its a hoax and I don't care. I agree with the sentiment whether it was said by Andy Rooney or not. It's just about covers it all!

Andy Rooney said on '60 Minutes' a few weeks back:

"I don't think being a minority makes you a victim of anything except numbers. The only things I can think of that are truly discriminatory are things like the United Negro College Fund, Jet Magazine, Black Entertainment Television, and Miss Black America. Just try to have things like
the United Caucasian College Fund, Cloud Magazine, White Entertainment Television, or Miss White America; and see what happens, Jesse Jackson will be knocking down your door.

Guns do not make you a killer. I think killing makes you a killer. You can kill someone with a baseball bat or a car, but no one is trying to ban you from driving to the ball game.

I believe they are called the Boy Scouts for a reason, which is why there are no girls allowed. Girls belong in the Girl Scouts! ARE YOU LISTENING, MARTHA BURKE?

I think that if you feel homosexuality is wrong, it is not a phobia, it is an opinion.

I have the right 'NOT' to be tolerant of others because they are different, weird, or tick me off.

When 70% of the people who get arrested are black, in cities where 70% of the population is black, that is not racial profiling; it is the Law of Probability.

I believe that if you are selling me a milkshake, a pack of cigarettes, a newspaper or a hotel room, you must do it in English! As a matter of fact, if you want to be an American citizen, you should have to speak English! My father and grandfather didn't die in vain so you can leave the countries you were born in to come over and disrespect ours.

I think the police should have every right to shoot you if you threaten them after they tell you to stop. If you can't understand the word 'freeze' or 'stop' in English, see the above lines.

I don't think just because you were not born in this country, you are qualified for any special loan programs, government sponsored bank loans or tax breaks, etc., so you can open a hotel, coffee shop, trinket store, or any other business. We did not go to the aid of certain foreign countries and risk our lives in wars to defend their freedoms, so that decades later they could come over here and tell us our constitution is a living document; and open to their interpretations.

I don't hate the rich; I don't pity the poor. I know pro wrestling is fake, but so are movies and television... That doesn't stop you from watching them.

I think Bill Gates has every right to keep every penny he made and continue to make more. If it ticks you off, go and invent the next operating system that's better, and put your name on the building.

It doesn't take a whole village to raise a child right, but it does take a parent to stand up to the kid and smack their little behinds when necessary, and say 'NO!'

I think tattoos and piercing are fine if you want them, but please don't pretend they are a political statement. And, please, stay home until that new lip ring heals. I don't want to look at your ugly infected mouth as you serve me French fries!

I am sick of 'Political Correctness.' I know a lot of black people, and not a single one of them was born in Africa; so how can they be 'African-Americans'? Besides, Africa is a continent.
I don't go around saying I am a European-American because my great, great, great, great, great, great grandfather was from Europe.. I am proud to be from America and nowhere else.
And if you don't like my point of view, tough ...

I PLEDGE ALLEGIANCE TO THE FLAG, OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA , AND TO THE REPUBLIC, FOR WHICH IT STANDS, ONE NATION UNDER GOD, INDIVISIBLE, WITH LIBERTY AND JUSTICE FOR ALL!

It is said that 86% of Americans believe in God. Therefore I have a very hard time understanding why there is such a problem in having 'In God We Trust' on our money and having 'God' in the Pledge of Allegiance. Why don't we just tell the 14% to BE QUIET!!!

Christmas Decos a go go

Bishop and I got up early and he suggested that we take the day to get all the outside decorations down, packed up and put away. We did it too! Everything is all finished, just don't look at what's inside- That is going to be put away after I come home from Salt Lake City next week.

Happy New Year- last of the visitors

Linda and Denny came to spend a few days with us, so of course we had to have a crab dinner!

Larry is serious about cracking it just right, umm it was good.

One of the main reasons they came to town was to go to the Rose Parade, and we did it up right. We had primo seats in the bleachers right across from the Simon Rosenthal Museum, and just under the KTLA booth. Every float, horse group, marching band and all did their best stuff right in front of us facing us! It was an awsome experience.

Before the parade got started, we parked in such a spot, so that we could walk back along where they were lining up the floats before the parade and I would hurt your eyes if I blogged every picture of float flower that Larry got close up. It was fun and so well worth going.