The continuing stooooooooory of a quack who's gone to the dogs....

(Nope, sorry -- no stories of the lake yet. But since most people who read this were there, I'm not feeling too pressed.)

Plot summary for Season 2, Episode ...er, 5 of "Jen's Back Saga". (This is a doozy; a special two-part episode!) Dad and I went for my follow-up appointment with the neurosurgeon yesterday, and got a lot more information than we had before, possibly because we only got to meet with his PA at the first visit. First, he told us more about what the surgery option would look like, and the short of it is, not good. It would be much more extensive than just a fusion, since (enter new information) I not only have a problem with my disks, but the vertebrae joints are arthritic. Surgery would have to deal with that problem, too, and it would involve metal plates, screws, and rods and a six-month recovery time. Up to that point, Dad and I had both been thinking, why not just do the fusion, fix the problem, and get it over with? Well, yeah...that's why not.

So the good news is, no surgery! And of course, that's also the bad news, since there is no other "fix." The injection two weeks ago helped, but it only took care of the radiating pain in my legs; it won't actually help the pain in my back. (Yeah. Ironic.) They're going to start me on an intensive course of physical therapy to build up my core muscles, give me some lower-grade pain meds, and we'll try some different injections to target the arthritis. He wouldn't make any predictions about how long it would take to get me feeling better, but it sounds like it's going to be a while yet. He used that horrible phrase "lifestyle changes".

After we came home, Dad and I talked for a while about what I ought to do in the fall. Finally it seemed like the most sensible thing to do would be to turn down my externship with Children's National Medical Center, take courses part-time at IPS, and see if they could give me an on-site externship that would allow me to gradually get back into seeing clients as I felt ready. I went through a lot of fretting and agonizing over the decision, since the externship was a great thing for me, but in the end I sent the e-mail to their supervisor and started talking with IPS professors about my plan. They were cautiously optimistic about working something out.

"Okay, so that's that!" I thought. Difficult decision finally made, but it will all be for the best. I took a deep breath and settled down to mentally adjust to the change. ...then I got a phone call from the supervisor at Children's at about 7:30pm. She was very kind and sympathetic, but essentially said, "No, we can't function this year without you. There's no way." I explained, she explained -- all very reasonable on both sides, and completely unworkable for both.

Then there was a pause.

"Well," she said, "I think we could manage to shift things around so that we could cover your work for 8 weeks, but definitely not longer than that. The official start-date is September 1, so... do you think you could start with us in November?"

November! Four months away! Of course I can do that! She gave me a list of assessments to begin learning and practicing on my own, we chatted about the program and this and that, she told me to keep her posted on my progress, and we hung up happy. I still have my externship position, and I have enough time to recuperate so that the work won't set me back. Great news!

There was one last little bonus to the day. I was puttering away on my computer and saw that I had a new e-mail. From my statistics professor, of all people. "I was thinking about this final exam you still have to take for me," he said, "and I looked at your grades from the semester. Figuring the scores you got on your two mid-terms and deducting the 25 points from the final exam that covered material you haven't been tested on yet, you could skip the final and still get a B for the semester. What do you think?"

Please. I never answered an e-mail so fast in my life! God is pulling the technical details together for me, with a few nice little surprises on the side. :)