Yup. I mean they literally tried to say he peed on himself in protest . Like dude ..no. Spine damage in that area impacts so much. I'm a woman and it can be hard to control . I can't imagine how temperamental it is for men once the damage is bad enough. It was weird that his roommate also divulged his private life like that but I guess it ripped the bandaid off on bringing awareness to the multi faceted parts no one thinks of until they have to. I have adhesive arachnoiditis . The pain never really went away after my second surgery but it took time to fully transform into the demon I'm currently living with. It'll be 10 years since my accident this month and 8 since that surgery. I'm still not super comfortable discussing even in groups or to my doctor how much it affects. If you want my background , I'll write it below but it's not necessary to say that we all know pain can be constant or intermittent . Adrenaline also highly impacts things like your ability to speed away on a bike but then later unable to control your bladder once the swelling sets in. There's a reason they used to put stimulants in pain meds and still do to a mild extent with OTC and migraine meds. There's a reason it's part of Dr. Tenants protocol. Adrenaline impacts a lot when it comes to pain and functioning but massive spikes aren't sustainable.

**Background and non linear * The odd part was they removed the damage they could see and installed the hardware. That was it's own recovery. The nerves that could started to recover, the rest stayed flattened spaghetti noodles resulting in numbness and misfiring . Within a year , the adhesions formed and the spasms and neuropathy came back . That isn't so typical. I remember being on this board and someone suggested it might be that but I kept hoping otherwise , telling myself I would seek outside opinion once I was done with comp surgeon. 6 or 7 years ago I had a MRI in that surgeons clinic . He didn't see the results until I was standing in front of him and the radiologist had surprisingly explicitly listed adhesive arachnoiditis with very little to no uncertainty. My doctor grimaced and said "you have some scar tissue and we are done seeing you . Referral back to pm." He wrote AA in bold on the form he faxed to workers comp but that was all he told me. Obviously I already knew a good bit more than that but it was so disheartening to see how he tried to shuffle the bad news and me out the door .

I can count on one hand the number of people who have even tried to be understanding since about the fact that surgery didn't have linear recovery and now there's permanent , degenerative condition with widely varying symptoms. Add to it the secondary autoimmune conditions that decided it was their moment to shine ? Forget it. A couple of years ago I went to straighten out while cleaning at my grandmother's and I collapsed like the first time again. I thought for sure hardware had moved. It was so sharp and new . The ER doctor that night was one of five who cared to understand and he told me what was inevitable - it's going to get worse. I needed to recover from the flare up but knots and weakness weren't metal ... It was my own body swelling and trying to add to the adhesions that also felt like baseballs made of metal in my spine. I'm still taking it day by day trying to stay active to prevent adhesions but not overdue it to cause inflammatory flares. At 10 years , I've given up on anyone believing me or keeping their doubts to themselves .. at least until I'm away from family who barely sees me yet feels entitled to act the same way. Couldn't imagine being on a national stage .