Hope

"Where there is life, there is hope."

Today, not for the first time, I had a doctor use that fateful term in reference to me: "Interesting". It would appear that the particular combination of weaknesses and (comparative) strengths in my right arm presents some food for thought for those medical professionals who specialise in the hand.
The first doctor I met today, just after greeting me and welcoming me into his office, said "Your handshake tells me a lot of the story". After nearly an hour of describing my history and issues, then moving my arm, wrist, hand, fingers and thumbs in every conceivable direction I then went to see a second doctor to repeat the process.
The prognosis? Well, they confirmed that my wrist flexors aren't working and the extensors are over active. This is causing issues for the rest of the tendons in my hand and wrist. So what can be done about it? Well, for starters I go back to my OT for a sensitivity study (the sense of touch in my hands, not my emotions) and to try a different style of splint/brace to help me with the clawing in my fingers. Then, in a couple of months I go back to see the hand specialist - given the variability I've had with strength in my triceps, he'd like to confer with colleagues to give the nerves time to "settle down".
When I go back we'll discuss some of the different treatment options, each of which have different risk/reward profiles. These options range from fusion (I didn't like the sound of that) to hooking my brachial muscle up to a different tendon - it would appear that whilst my brachial muscle is working, but isn't actually connected to anything functional and is therefore quite useless.
As my case is "interesting", he also discussed bringing me in to a meeting of specialists, where I'd be the subject of a round table discussion. I think it'd be a pretty interesting experience to be a live case study in that sort of scenario.

It was a good experience in that while I visited a surgeon, he wasn't in a rush to cut me open, and was quite concerned the result wouldn't be positive if he did - there are pretty much two type sof muscles in my arm: dead and weak, and surgery runs the risk of making the weak ones weaker. Having said that, for the first time in a while there are multiple potential treatments, some of which may make things better rather simply preventing them from getting worse. This inspires some hope in me.

The wait is over

Yesterday I saw my neurosurgeon. I was told that there are no structural issues in my spine: the nerve exits are clear and there are no bone spurs. So, as it turns out, my current issues are just the evolving complications of syringomyelia. Apparently I can expect peaks and troughs of these symptoms; given that my right hand is currently little more than a club I'm hoping I'm at the depths of a trough at the moment.
Now my main hope is that when I visit the hand and wrist specialist next month he can offer me some sort of help, otherwise I'm reduced to hoping for improvement.

More in early September after I see the next doctor...

Update

What an inspired post title!
Last Friday I went off to see my neurosurgeon. Looking at my existing scans he had three theories for what was causing my current symptoms:

1. I may have a bone spur around C6/7 putting pressure on the nerve emerging from the spinal cord there
2. My cyst is only partially deflated, and is putting pressure on the spinal cord there
3. It's just ongoing degeneration

I have a strange feeling it's #1, but I'm not sure why. At any rate, I went in for a dose of radiation (CT scan) this morning so he can get a better look at how everything is hanging together at the moment. Unfortunately, I was not bitten by any irradiated spiders while I was there. Also, CT scans are way quicker than MRI. I was in and out of the place in short order - it took longer for them to bill me than it did for me to register, wait, and get scanned.
The lady told me the results should be back by Wednesday or Thursday, so I'm not really expecting to hear anything until next week.
The waiting continues...

Retirement

Last night we had our winter comp touch football grand final. Having not won a competition in about three years and losing our last grand final, I'm happy to report we managed a 4-3 win. I spent most of the second half wishing the game would hurry up and finish as I was so nervous about maintaining our lead.
After the game I announced that I'd be hanging up my boots. My continued frustration at not being able to play effectively, the ongoing degeneration of my hand/arm function and my feeling of being a burden to the team combined until I knew it was the right decision. Hopefully it's not a permanent decision, and my health improves enough for me to make a comeback, but until then I don't think it's fair on myself or the team to keep playing.

Thanks to the great staff at my neurosurgeon's office I'm off to see the doctor on Friday. I'm guessing I'll be off to get some tests after that, then jump back into the queue to see him again, after which I can see three possible scenarios:

• I have some form of operation
• I start some form of therapy
• I do nothing

Of these, the third is the least palatable. Knowing I have the potential for my health to worsen and not be able to do anything about is a particularly is extremely frustrating for someone like myself who thrives on knowledge and information - the many variables and unanswerable questions constantly tick away in my brain. At least in three days or so time I'll know a little more.

Back on the merry-go-round

My visit to the physio ran pretty much to script. I described the problem, he got me to push and pull my arm and wrist through various positions, he remarked on the noticeable comparable weakness in areas associated with C6-C8, mainly around C7. Lot's of words like "Brachial" and "Anterior" got thrown around, but the gist of it was that something was not working right between my brain and my arm.
So, down the hall to the neurosurgeon's office I went. The first available appointment is in September, but the lovely receptionist was going to get my file in front of the doctor so he could ask for any necessary tests before seeing me, instead of drawing things out by seeing me, asking for tests, then seeing me again. One of the benefits of being a regular customer I suppose.
I'm surprisingly upbeat about this at the moment. I'm not sure why - considering it was only in May that I thought I'd never have to see the neurosurgeon again, I'd expect to be a bit more upset or at least disappointed.
Back to the waiting game...

Do you want the bad news?

My sporadic posting continues, as does the bad news. I'd been noticing that some of the exercises given to me by my physio didn't feel quite right - I was lacking a full range of movement in some, felt like I had reduced power and was struggling to complete the longer sets recommended by my physio. Then, one day when kicking back on the couch I realised I couldn't push my right arm straight up without assistance. This is scary. While I've had issues with subtle deterioration in my hand and arm, I've never had outright failure of a major movement like this before. I'm heading back to the physio ASAP and direly hoping it's something muscular and not related to my neck.
That is probably an outrageously optimistic viewpoint and I'll be walking over to my neurosurgeon's office straight after.

To make things more "interesting", I'm working in Canberra at the moment, and it's pretty cold this time of year. Normally my hand claws right up in the cold, but my right arm has been curling in lately as well. I've only spilled three coffees and dropped one sandwich as a result - probably not a bad effort.
I've been continuing to play touch footy as well, but I'm starting to feel like even more of a burden to the team. I'm struggling to get to full pace when I run, and catching and passing are getting harder. Last night I took a fall and landed on my right elbow, jarring my shoulder. I had some very familiar pins and needles straight away, and could barely move my arm for about 15 minutes.

Sp, that's the gloomy view at the moment. Things can only get better though. Right?

Hand-some

OK, so it looks like this blog isn't dead - I've got another booking with a medical specialist (with the obligatory three month wait), this time he's a hand/wrist surgeon . I felt that recently my hand function had been deteriorating, so I went to revisit my OT. He somewhat confirmed my fears - my wrist had weakened on one side compared to my last visit. Given the compression of my spinal cord had been resolved with my last op, this shouldn't have been happening. So given that my neurosurgeon thinks everything in my neck is fine, off to see the hand specialist I go.
It looks like I've got at least a few more months of dropping the ball at touch footy and struggling to tie shoelaces ahead of me! Not to mention my hand turning to a club in the cold. Even some basic things like holding a book are a bit harder.