Cheryl’s SCI Stem Cell Treatment Blog

Changes

November 21st, 2006

There have been several changes noted to date.

1) Since my accident, I have required a full 12 hours sleep every night. This means I have had to chose to either give up my evening or my next morning. Sleeping half your time away is not a great way to accomplish a lot. I now find I get by on the normal 7-8 hours.

2) I have been plagued by constant nausea and it is not uncommon for me to throw up on a daily basis with no warning. As a result, I have had no appetite and my weight has dropped dangerously low at times, 85 lbs. The nausea is completely gone and I find myself hungry all the time now. I have finally started to gain some much needed weight.

3) The muscles on my claves and thighs have suffered some severe atrophy. I notice now that my calves have started to resemble and feel normal again. The thighs are just beginning to show some differences so wearing dresses and skirts will once again be an option.

4) I am developing some sensation on the right leg. I have had several flashes of cold down the outside of the leg although none recently. The rest of the leg has a constantly moving pins and needles sensation that changes in intensity, duration and area. It feels almost as if the leg is trying to wake up. I seem to have sensation to pressure in areas but nothing tactile as of yet. I also seem to be sweating behind the knees which I am told is a good sign. I am not positive whether or not I did this before as it is not something I took note of.

5) I have developed some movement in both legs however the left leg seems to have more strength. I noticed, quite by accident, that when I was laying down my legs seemed to want to spread apart. I had no concious ability of how to do this. I am now at the point where I am working my way up to a semi reclining position and can control which leg I move as well as how far I move it. At the moment, I can only move them apart and am not able to move them together, ankle to ankle so to speak. When laying on my side, I am able to pull my knee in the direction of my chin. I initially could only do this sporadically and with intense concentration. I had to have my legs bare as the friction of cloth against cloth created too much drag for me to move the legs at all. My leg accidentally slipped off the side of the bed and I discovered I was able to lift it using mostly my abdominal muscles. I lifted it not only back onto the bed, but up and over the other leg clearing it by a good 3-4 inches. I was in such a state of shock that the only thing I could think to do was grab my leg, throw it off the bed and see if I could successfully repeat the move again, which I did. During this Jon was doing a little video taping and was able to catch the entire thing on tape, now exciting as it was definately a “first” for me.

6) I am developing some bladder control. Although I do not feel the urge to void, I can usually begin the get my urine flowing by thinking about releasing the bladder. Now the big problem here is as I am transfering to the toilet, I often find my bladder starts to release and my pants are not yet off. It is pretty hard to think of something else, after all, that is what I am in the room for. I also seem to have developed some incontinance and am embarassed to find I often awake to find I have wet the bed. I have learned that this is part of the process as the bladder ceases to be constantly spasmed closed and begins to release on its’ own. As long as it is a learning curve and something that will progress I have no problem being like a toddler who is being toilet trained. “Look Mommy, I pee-pee’d in the potty”.

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