Prayer Request

As a lot of you know, I have been suffering from chronic back pain over the course of the past year...and occasional back pain for the four years before that. It is all due to a car wreck that I was in when I was 18...that was actually pretty bad.

Well, over the past year it has gotten SO bad that there are days when it is impossible for me to do anything but lay on the couch....and as you can imagine...thats not an option for me! I finally got an appointment with a neurosurgeon...and he did some x-rays and decided that I needed an MRI. I got the MRI results today...and it wasn't very good news. Turns out that I don't just have one herniated disc...I have 2...one of which is pretty severe. The L5 (the lowest disc in your back) is herniated quite substantially...and also has started to fragment. Because of these herniated discs...I have quite a bit of pressure on my sciatic nerve...which is causing me to go completely numb on my whole left side.

So with that background...here is the prayer request. I have two options...I can either have epidural/steroid injections which MAY or MAY NOT deal with the symptoms. It doesn't fix the problem...and there is a chance it may not even deal with the pain. Not to mention the injections are fairly expensive and I need to have up to 3 per year...EVERY year. My second option is do have a micro discectomy. This is where they go in...and trim down the bulging discs so that they are no longer able to fragment and put pressure on the nerves. Its an outpatient procedure...the full recovery period is 6 weeks...(I would have to lay VERY low for 7-10 days) AND it would fix the problem permanently! The doctor says the decision is up to me...but that if I want permanent relief and LESS cost then I should have the surgery. (My surgery copay is only 100...and the epidural injections will cost me $100 EACH time. ) I am going to start out with epidural injections...but I really think I will end up having surgery. I would really like for you all to pray that I can make the best decision regarding surgery. I am really leaning towards having it...just because I would rather take 6 weeks of recovery...verses numerous shots...expenses and 48 hours recovery PER injection.

Thanks guys!!