Patient- Mrs Kiran Dutta

I wish I knew your mother's age but I was 66 when I had L3-L4-L5. It changed my condition from left side low level chronic lower back pain  with occasional sudden dibilitating and eye watering pain that would occur 4-5 times a month and last from a few hours to a few days to now where I have chronic pain a notch or 2 higher all the time with spikes up to an 8-9 level when standing up or after laying on my side  a few hours. The total debilitating pain that would hit me before has never come back yet, but instead, after that surgery of fusing 2 discs, I now sleep no more than 4 hours, wake up then sleep another 2 or maybe 2 1/2 hours in 30 minute chunks. I can't sleep on my side anymore and that is the position that is most comfortable for the rest of my body. When your spine gets fused the joints adjacent to the ones that are fused take more load and deteriorate faster. Your spine needs to flex and fusion will prevent it. But if you can't endure the pain an you elect to undergo fusion, try your best to fuse just the one joint you mentioned of L3-L4. Most folks I have spoken with that have had only 1 joint fused have had better outcomes than anyone I've spoken with that have had 2 or more joints fused. I used to be able to sleep wonderfully before even with a back problem and occasionally wake for a few seconds from a pain spike. Now I dread the end of my day because I can fall asleep only if I get so sleepy that my knees buckle while I'm standing up, or I take ambian, and then its only as I describe above. Now after a double fusion, I have a bit higher level constant pain and have trouble laying down sleeping and get pain from sitting but do not have the occasional debilitating pain. I would prefer the way I was, or wish they fused only 1 joint. Hope I didn't complicate it more but just tryimng to give you details