Theresa's Story

My Egoscue story
My Egoscue journey began in 1990 with a headache that would not go away. A brain MRI showed that I had a tumor in a deadly spot if it were to grow – in the pineal gland. Pineal tumors occur in approximately 1% of the population and survival, once discovered, is not that high because the pineal gland is located right where the spinal fluid splashes onto the brain. At the time I was diagnosed, the tumor was considered in operable. Fortunately, subsequent MRIs confirmed that it was very stable and was not growing at all. My neurologist began to think that I might have been born with it. Life went on, but I had to learn to live with the never-ending headache.

Childbirth
In 1992, I gave birth to our son. During childbirth, I experienced an amniotic embolism with disseminated intravascular coagulation (D.I.C.). This is an extremely rare and usually fatal condition where the baby's amniotic fluid enters the mother's bloodstream, causing her blood to clot everywhere. Normally, the mother and child are both lost when a blood clot is thrown to a lung, heart or to the brain. Even when the mother survives the embolism, she can go into D.I.C. where she no longer has the ability to clot. This is what happened to me while in the middle of a C-section. I was bleeding freely out of my I.Vs, uterus, surgical cut, and every opening. I was hooked up to a rapid transfuser that heated and pumped donor blood into my body almost as fast as I was losing it. We just had to wait and pray that my blood would start clotting. Our son was born at 10:30 p.m. and I miraculously started clotting at 3:30 a.m. My expected six to nine month hospital stay lasted just six days.

After my miraculous recovery, I thought that most certainly the worst was behind me. Now that our son was here safe and sound, we could go on happily with our lives. I was looking forward to our future, although in the background, I was now quietly dealing with some neck and shoulder pain and the ever-present headache.

Revealing MRI
In 1998, I was sitting at my computer at work when the pain in my neck suddenly became unbearable. I could not even tolerate my arm touching my desk. I picked up the phone to once again explain to my doctor how the pain in my left shoulder and neck was getting worse. Previous attempts with him had been met with explanations that nothing serious could be wrong because I had not had a recent injury or accident. He had said that I was just suffering from whiplash with pain radiating down my left shoulder and insisted that I would have to learn to live with it. I was so relieved to find that he was not in the day I called, and that his partner wanted to see me. At that visit, this new doctor agreed that I should have an MRI.

Pain Management attempt
Everyone but me was surprised when the results came in. Three discs in my neck were badly herniated. My left shoulder had unexplained tears and perforations. I was immediately referred to both a pain management doctor and a neurosurgeon. I was overjoyed that now I would get the help I had long been praying for. After starting the use of strong narcotics and muscle relaxants, I was stunned to find the pain was barely touched. My husband, Rick, immediately made me an appointment with Egoscue and drove me the seven hour round trip to San Diego. The “menu” of exercises I was given there seemed to help a bit, and I was very encouraged. Now, I had the relief I had been praying for. I thanked God and went back to work armed with my medications and my daily menu. However, I got worse, not better, as the days went by.

Within three months another MRI set was ordered. This one showed that five of the seven discs in my neck were herniated to the left, severely enough to bend and compress my spinal cord. Another test showed that I had some nerve damage as well. Obviously, the cause was worse than any of us had thought. But what was it? Nothing but the result showed up on the MRIs. We then added facet injections and trigger point injections to my pain management program. Facet injections are an outpatient process where both a long-lasting corticosteroid and an anesthetic numbing agent (e.g., lidocaine) are injected directly into the facet joints that connect each vertebra. The medications are intended to reduce inflammation and provide pain relief that lasts days to years. At the same time, I was also getting alternating injections of lidocaine or botox injected directly into the constant visible spasms in my neck and back.

The powerful narcotic OxyContin, was added to my routine as well as an electronic muscle stimulator that would deliver tiny electrical pulses directly to my muscle spasms. Neither of these additions nor the injections made a dent in my pain. Because finding a comfortable position was impossible for more than 15-20 minutes, I wasn’t sleeping any more than nine hours per week. The neurosurgeon decided to open me up for a 30-60 minute exploratory surgery.

Neck Surgery
We were all shocked afterwards to realize that the surgery actually took nine hours. Scar tissue from a clavicle (collarbone) break when I was ten years old had grown through my shoulder muscles, wrapping around my veins, arteries, brachial plexus, ribs, and finally attaching to my discs in my neck. At last, my lack of progress was explained but I was scared of what was ahead of me to fix all the damage the scar tissue had done. My neurosurgeon wanted to completely fuse my neck because the bending and compressing of my spine could sever my spinal cord causing paralysis, especially if I had any kind of jolting accident. I asked for time to consult with Egoscue in an attempt to keep my neck from being fused. I was given a three-month timeframe. If improvement had not occurred by the end of three months, I agreed to let him fuse my neck.

By 2002, I was on full time disability. My circle of daily interaction was basically limited to healthcare professionals, attorneys, human resources personnel, disability insurance reps, Social Security administrators and various accounts payable personnel. I also met with my Egoscue therapist to set up a plan to meet the three-month deadline. I was given three 30 to 60-minute menus to do daily followed by a 20-minute walk at the end of each. This and dealing with my mountain of medical/disability paperwork was now my full-time job. At first, there was no impact on my pain, but I persevered. Around my third or fourth day, however, I finally noticed a pain reduction during parts of my menus. A few days later, I also had relief for 15–30 minutes following my menus as well. Gradually, my muscles began to relax long enough to allow me to sleep three hours at a time and to be able to sit, stand, or walk for much longer periods of time. The three-month milestone MRI showed to my doctor’s amazement that the discs, although still damaged, had begun their journey back into place. My spinal cord was no longer in danger of being severed. After 18 months, all of the discs in my neck were back in place, showed no degeneration and had normal height and hydration. However, this great news was followed by the very scary news that the supposedly stable tumor in the center of my head was suddenly no longer stable but was growing.

Gamma Knife
I was referred to the doctor who had literally written the book on these very rare brain tumors. My tumor was closing off where the spinal fluid splashes onto my brain causing my persistent headache. This doctor had a new toy he had wanted to try out on these rare tumors called Gamma Knife; now he had me to experiment on. In July of 2003, I underwent Gamma Knife radiation to blast the tumor in my pineal gland. The preparation for the Gamma Knife was the most difficult part of the process. A titanium apparatus was literally screwed into my skull just above my eyes and at the base of the back of my head. A plastic bowl that resembled a large fish bowl with 210 holes drilled in it was then placed on the apparatus. Each hole was carefully measured from the hole to the top of my head to simulate the direction the gamma rays would safely enter my head. All 210 rays were to converge on one small spot in the center of my head. An “up-to-the minute” MRI was taken to ensure that there hadn’t been any changes to the tumor. I laid down on the gamma knife bed, which resembles an MRI bed. Then they screwed the apparatus attached to my head to the Gamma Knife table, complete with a helmet resembling a welder’s helmet. When they said, "DON'T MOVE!" during Gamma Knife, they meant it! After 15 minutes of 210 gamma rays entering my head, the doctor excitedly shouted, “We nailed it!” I noticed immediately that my headache was finally gone for the first time in 12 years and we all celebrated that my tumor was gone…for a while.

I had been looking forward to a future where we could do activities as a family that did not involve a doctor’s office or hospital. But at an annual “brain and neck MRI results” appointment with my neurosurgeon, he discovered that a previously known neck disc fragment was no longer floating in my spinal canal but was now lodged in my spinal cord, cutting it like glass. To remove the disc fragment, I would need a one-level cervical disc fusion for him to reach it, which I had done in February of 2005. Then, inconceivably, just four days after surgery, I was rear-ended while sitting in the passenger’s seat of a car. Not only was the pain back but I was told that I now needed to fuse the disc above my new fusion.

Brain Surgery
But, shockingly, this would have to wait because my recent 2005 brain MRI had shown that the previous doctor had not "nailed it" as he had claimed, but instead had blown a hole through the center of the pineal tumor. The tumor had now grown so big that it had blasted through my pineal gland (I no longer have one), both invading and wrapping around my brain stem. It was very sobering to hear my neurosurgeon tell me to “get family members on planes and get your affairs in order” because there was every possibility I would not make it off the table alive. It was not only difficult telling my family that not surviving this surgery was a very real possibility, but also that I may have so many strokes during the surgery that I may not be “me” anymore. My neurosurgeon also had told me that I would be “out” for approximately five days and in I.C.U., and then in the hospital another week. From there I was scheduled for three months at a rehab hospital to re-learn how to walk and talk, etc. To everyone’s shock, however, I awoke just hours after the surgery, was released from the hospital after six days, and did not need any rehab! Since the tumor was located where the spinal fluid splashed onto the brain, I believe that having done Egoscue menus so faithfully re-aligned all of my discs and spinal canal so well that the cerebral spine fluid could make its journey much less unfettered and provided me every chance for this miraculous recovery.

C-spine Surgery #2
Once I recovered a bit from the brain surgery, we could turn our focus back onto my neck and the pain from the car accident. During this surgery, my neurosurgeon removed the metal plate and screws from the previous fusion and now fused the disc above it. When I woke up, I felt better. He said he had also removed a large bone spur that had coiled tightly around a nerve causing some of my pain. I was very optimistic after this surgery and again ready to reclaim an active life. But I became concerned when after six months I was unable to run, swim or even tolerate bumps in the road. Any jarring of my body was getting harder and harder to tolerate. I was told that my x-rays and MRIs both showed that the fusions were “solid.” Two years after the surgery I had the same limitations and the pain was not only back but was worse. I was even fainting and vomiting at work from pain. My neurosurgeon sternly told me, “I don’t know what’s wrong with you, but whatever it is, it’s NOT surgical.” After that rebuke, I bounced from doctor to doctor for a total of three years losing more and more of my friends, my family, and my life. Finally I found a doctor who would order a CT scan. To everyone’s astonishment, it showed that the two “solid fusions” were not fused at all. I had been walking around with a broken neck in two places for three years! Equally stupefying, during an unrelated pain test, a tumor was discovered in my right thyroid.

Thyroid Surgery & C-spine Surgery #3
I had the thyroid tumor removed in June of 2008. It had taken up the entire right half of my thyroid gland and had invaded my esophagus to the point that it needed re-construction. After waiting three months for my esophagus to recover, it was time to finally get my neck fixed. The old hardware in my neck was removed; this time my own bone marrow was injected into three disc spaces and wrapped with special plastic that would bond with my bone marrow to create new bone, and new hardware put in. Although still early, this surgery seems to be a success.

My Gratitude to Egoscue
Obviously, my body has gone through an extraordinary amount of trauma. But I know without a doubt that were it not for Egoscue, the results of my surgeries would have been far, far worse. The Egoscue Method saved my entire neck from being fused. The doctors had made it clear that they believed such an outcome was impossible, but with Egoscue I defied convention. I am doing exceedingly well and have lived to tell about it where many others have not. We all wish that just by doing our e-cises that any affliction to our bodies can magically heal. In my case, a dysfunctional posture had been only one contributing factor to my pain. Grateful to a rare and small group of medical experts, I also must give Pete Egoscue and his Method profound credit for my recovery.