Till Doug's Walking and Working

Doug has already taken a few months unpaid hiatus from work due to herniated discs and deterioration in his lower back and he worked with severe back pain for 3 months prior. The doctor told him to take just a week off to let PT do its magic on his back and that worked but unfortunately the pain shifted down his leg to the point where he quickly became unable to walk, mostly bedridden and had to leave work again. He's had cortisone shots, more PT, nerve conductor tests, numerous MRIs and the symptoms were finally disappearing, but the orthopedic surgeon wanted to perform a "routine" diskogram for which we were told would have no side effects to see if major surgery would help eliminate the problem. Since then, he can barely eat, sleep, has major vertigo, migraines and his original pain or worse has come back and he has a hard time walking again. The doctor says that surgery is off the table and we are seeking another opinion on where to go from here because at this point, it seems that all is our options have been exhausted. Doug just wants to get better and go back to work. He's terrified that he'll lose his job because of being off this long unexpectedly, which being that it is strictly commission-based means that he has no income, wasn't eligible disability and so Doug, myself and our 10 year old daughter are surviving on my income, which doesn't come close to covering our bills and the little bit of savings that we have after all of the medical expenses that have accrued over the past months. Doug is working hard to get back to his life , but the stress of worrying about losing our home or worse has taken a toll on his ability to focus on getting himself better.