Kenneth Johnston

I did it. I finished the clock and put a beautiful movement inside with two melodious chimes (Westminster and Whittington). It is made with a birch and pine case, and I attached a 19 inch pendulum with a decending enclosure. It still needs a finish. My wife and I are deciding between a natural finish or something similar.

Since my five spine surgeries I am in constant pain unless I regularly exercise my back. I have an excellent physical therapist who has shown me how to exercise the spine without doing it harm. His philosophy is NOT “No pain no gain.” In fact, he says if it starts to hurt one should stop or cut back on the number of repitions or eliminate that particular exercise altogether. Better yet, find out if you are doing the exercise wrongly and get counsel as to how to do it right.

The whole point is to strengthen the muscels not to injure them further. My problem is that I have developed arthritis at the joints immobilized by fusion. Cortizone injections are necessary up to three times a year to break up the inflamation and osteophytes that grow trying to “protect” the joint which has been fused. Fluid also builds up which irritates and inflames nerves, which, of course causes pain.

The last resort is the ablation (destroying) of the nerve which is communicating the pain to the brain. This of course has risks, including making the pain worse if the wrong nerve or surrounding tissue is affected. Or worse, paralysis could set in leaving one debilitated for life. Obviously the ablation is a last resort if and only when pain becomes unbearable and cannot be mitigated by any other means.

So, exercise is the best and most effective and passive therapy which can be used. It is also the safest when done in the right way. So my goal is to stick to the exercise program after I am finished with prescribed physical therapy and am without the observance of a well trained professional.

I have suffered from back problems since childhood. I was born with a mild case of spina bifida. Fortunately the spinal cord did not protrude from the malformed verebrae. When I was born it was not known that one could have this condition without spinal cord protrusion, and even if they had known there would have been no available treatment anyway.

By the time I reached 30 years of age it was diagnosed by a physican appointed for an employer paid insurance plan. I was told that I would have drastic problems later in life without going into any specifics. I heard him, but I shrugged it off since I had had back trouble for so long and nothing seemed to be worsening.

But by age 40 I realized that the condition was getting more painful and I needed to adjust my career in the printing trade so that I could still work in a field that I loved and get away from heavy machinery and heavy lifting. I moved into graphic design and pre-press work and eventually became confident enough to start a business of my own.

I then developed migraine headaches which nearly threatened to end my entrepreneurship. I finally was forced to hire help which releived the intense headaches. After 8 years in business the stress caught up with me and I closed the business reluctantly.

I went into printing and publishing management for a while and then finally to newspaper publishing specializing in photography and page layout. I had been designing, publishing, and printing several jounals while in business and I felt confident that I would be able to do fine in the newspaper business (previously I had no interest in newspaper work because of my dislike of short deadlines).

I worked a year and a half for a small newspaper when I began to have neurological problems. After 2 surgeries I had to resign from my job because I could no longer endure the stress and failing health at the same time.

I hoped to return to work again only to begin to have severe back problems along with the neurological disease. Hope of returning to work faded as one surgery was followed by another and another until I found myself unable to walk anymore and I landed in a wheel chair by 2006.

I had two spine surgeries in 2004-2005 to repair a ruptured cervical spine disk and a herniated lumbar disk which gave me pain relief for the first time since I was 8 or 9 years old, but it only lasted for about 5 months. Then I ruptured a second cervical spine disk in the spring of 2005 and had surgery again to fuse that one. Then during physical therapy I ruptured two lumbar spine disks which put me in the wheel chair. After a double spinal fusion in November 2006 it took me 2 years to recover because of neurological complications.

I began a goal to return to my artwork by setting out to complete 24 watercolor paintings by the end of 2009. I now have two new herniated disks; one in the cervical and another in the lumbar spine. I now know that the neurological and spine diseases are related and are the result of the above mentioned “mild” spina bifida.

It has now been 10 years and 12 major surgeries later, but I know God has a new direction for my life. I do not feel sorry for myself. I can now at least walk a limited amount and have not had to use a wheel chair for 2 and a half years. I have had a full life and will continue to push ahead in spite of my limitations. If Hellen Keller could lead a victorious life being deaf and blind then who am I to complain?

I am now 58 years old. I have a lot of life ahead of me still and all eternity to enjoy. So I shall get on with living it in a new and different way trusting the God of our Lord Jesus Christ to lead the way to victory! “With God all things are possible.”