I found this new ASIAn place…

28 Nov

Hello to all and to all hello- A holiday greeting for our holiday meeting.

As required by my Post-master general, I will begin this message as so many of my other have. “I’m sorry I haven’t posted in such a long time………”

Now as required by my heart and brains, I will begin the second part of this message with immense and delightful thanks to everyone in my life. In the previous and superiorly written post, Audra covered much of what she was thankful for. So I feel no need to produce my list since redundancy is a fallacy. ***but secretly, thanks to my mom and dad for all of they have sacrificed***

When thinking about the structure of this post, I didn’t know whether I wanted a linear story, a roller coaster of emotion, or a 142 character description of my inner feelings. What my muse (Alex Falenczykowski (typist)) and I have decided is to rip this thing wide open with some kick ass news! As of August 30th 2012, my injury status was measured and defined as a C5 vertebrae complete injury with an ASIA (American Spinal Injury Association) score of A. Now I’m gonna get Bill Nye all up this. What we have here are two different measurements of my spinal cord status. 1. The vertical level of my injury, which determines what function and motor ability I have (shoulders, triceps, fingers, etc.), was originally C5 meaning that the 5th of 8 vertebrae in the cervical section of my spine was crushed. This in turn severed my spinal cord. Hoorah, this flawlessly segways us in my next point. 2. My ASIA score, based off a physician performed exam. ASIA scores help determine the completeness of the slice through the spinal cord by determining the full level of sensory ability over the entire body. Basically a doctor takes a safety pin, opens it, and pokes you with the sharp and dull side in key areas from head to toe. My responses to dull, sharp, and location are measured to determine an ASIA level. You’re every day Ernesto will have an E score meaning normal motor and sensory function. I started with an A score meaning a complete injury, no motor or sensory function below the injury site. *Any and all medical knowledge pompously stated in these posts can and will be either completely accurate or devastatingly inaccurate.

As of today, November 28th 2012, I have officially been moved up the ladder or down the spine…….. to a C6 ASIA C. This is cause to be happy and is significant for a few a few reasons. The first is in recovering both spinal cord cells and cervical health at all means that I can heal. The floodgates work. Now its just a matter of cranking them open super wide. The other cool thing about this is that I’ve jumped this far in only 4 months. The timeframe of recovery and healing for a young male is primarily in the first year with smaller pieces coming back in up to five years. Having gone this far in just 4 months is promising that I’ll continue to move farther in the coming months. When I say “is promising,” I mean that its definitally going to happen.

Thomas with a C5 ASIA A= 15-17% chance of walking
Thomas with a C6 ASIA C= 45-47% chance of walking
Thomas with a C6 ASIA C with the awesomeness and passion of his peeps and fam= 45-47% chance of walking…… but feels like 100%

Now to me, 45% isn’t enough, but the small victories build the castle……or something like that. What I’m doing to increase the likehood are things including: accupuncture, adaptive Yoga in and out of my wheelchair, a Locomat machine (which puts me on a treadmill and attaches my legs to robotic arms which walk my legs while being in a harness holding a certain amount of my body weight. This aligns my brain, spinal cord, and legs to encourage my nerves to relearn how to walk), a gluten free lifestyle, and many other things to come.

While all of these things are insanely exciting and progressing me towards walking, all of the increased activity in leg motion leaves me in pain by the end of the day. Its kind of a catch 22 that I’m doing this all so that I can walk and get around again. As of right now, after 5:00 I’m bedridden. But don’t feel to bad as this is definitely the good kind of pain.

Thank you to Alex Falenczykowski for helping me with this post.

Thanks to each and everyone of you for any thought, word, joke, or poetry you have produced for me because I will need them now more than ever as winter is coming, as is HBO’s runaway hit Game of Thrones.

Much Love. Hopefully talk to you sooner than later.
T-Bone

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