*Viewer discretion is advised.
Hey everyone!
After my recent blog post about my posterior occipital nerve decompression surgery, I had so many people reach out and ask to see pictures of the actual surgery - who knew so many of you were fascinated by that sort of thing. You asked, so I will show you!
I apologize in advance for anyone who gets queasy by the sight of blood or surgery pictures.
Let me show the pre-surgery picture again, just for reference.
 |
| The dotted line is where the main incision runs. |
So this is a picture of the right occipital nerve after he cut through my skin and the fatty tissue. You honestly can't even see the branches of the nerve because there is so much scar tissue. Yep, all that white and light pink stuff is scar tissue. Just FYI, it should NOT look like that.
This is a picture of same section after my surgeon removes the scar tissue and decompresses the nerves which were originally white. The nerves now have blood flow and are functioning like they are supposed to be.
In case you couldn't tell, these are the nerves (pointed to in white).
This is a picture of the portion of the occipital nerve going up the center of my neck. The bottom of my neck is on the left and the top of my head is on the right.
This picture is after my surgeon has removed the first layer of scar tissue. Again, the bottom of my neck is on the left and the top of my head is on the right.
And this is a picture of the nerves after my surgeon has removed even more scar tissue and decompressed the nerves that were being impinged by the muscle tissue.
Like, what?!?! I mean, this picture just says it all right here. No markings needed! This is what the nerves should look like in the average person.
It just goes to show, I definitely needed this surgery!
And an update on my recovery 3 weeks out...
I have had one headache that was about a 3 on a pain scale of 1-10 and it went away in 4 hours. I can't even tell you the last time a headache went away in 4 hours. I am still in pain, but my range of motion is slowly getting better! I started back to work today and I started driving again yesterday. So thankful for my progress, my doctors and my surgeon, and for you all for the prayers!
