Cyborg Man - 2/22/2011
I suffer from chronic facial pain on both sides of my face. The pain is localized on the cheeks and around the noise. It is the second branch of the trigeminal nerve. The chronic pain was caused by one of the chemos drugs I took during my cancer treatments. It some how caused nerve damage in my face.
The doctors are now using neuro-stimulators to help with chronic nerve pain. The stimulators are commonly used for chronic back pain, but now are expanding out to other parts of the body. I was lucky enough to have the health insurance to approve the stimulator for chronic facial pain.
The surgery I had yesterday is called a trial surgery. Basically only putting the wires into body, while the electronic box is on the outside. The trial is used to make sure the stimulator works, before implanting everything into the body. Here are some pics of the wires coming out of my face.
I can only use the stimulator for a short period of time currently. The doctors want to wait a couple of days for the body to heal. But the good thing is I am seeing some good results for the short time that it is on. Tomorrow I am allowed to run it all day. If the trial is a success, I will have the full surgery in about a month and a half. The bad thing is they have to remove the wires for that month and a half. If it works, it going to be the longest month and a half of my life