Surgery, Function, and the Brain: 72 Hours Post-Op: Protection, Patience & “The Zipper”

This is the second in a series of "Surgery, Function, and the Brain" blogs on Maria's recent surgical experience.  See her first blog Starting This Journey.

72 hours post-op recovery is not about pushing limits — it is about protection, patience, and allowing inflammation to settle while the nervous system recalibrates. In these early days, the body is repairing tissue, the brain is interpreting signals, and the difference between danger and discomfort becomes clinically fascinating.

Seventy-two hours after a laminectomy at L4–5 and L5–S1, here’s what stands out most:

My team were exceptional.

From surgeon to anaesthetist to nursing staff — there was calm competence everywhere. Total confidence in your treating team matters. It lowers anticipatory threat, reduces hypervigilance, and allows the nervous system to settle. When you trust the hands you’re in, your body responds differently.

That is not soft psychology.  That is neurobiology or neuroscience.

Pain, Medication & Choice

I’ve taken three Palexia in three days. That’s it.

And I didn’t love the side effects — cognitively foggy, slightly disconnected, not myself.

So I’ve opted for simple analgesia: Panadol and a daily Celebrex for the next two weeks to manage inflammation and post-operative swelling.

The surgeon’s report described “severe nerve root compression.”

That validation mattered. The neurological symptoms weren’t imagined. They made anatomical sense.

There is something psychologically regulating about coherence between symptoms and structure.

Sensory Pain vs Emotional Pain

What has fascinated me most is separating:

• Sensory pain
• Emotional distress

They intersect — but they are not identical.

The sensation is clear. My brain labels certain movements as “dangerous.” It sends protective signals to limit movement during early tissue healing.

That’s appropriate.

But I’m not feeling catastrophic distress with it. Why?

Because I know this pain is temporary. It has context. It has a timeline. It has meaning.  Pain without threat feels very different from pain with uncertainty.

This is the difference between sensation and suffering.

When Emotion Spikes the Body

There was one clear reminder that recovery isn’t just mechanical.

Friends visited. Conversation drifted — unintentionally — to a very stressful situation.

Within minutes, my blood pressure spiked to 192.  It took hours to settle to 168, and by the following morning it was back to 129/70.

Nothing structural changed in my spine during that time.  What changed was psychological state.

The sympathetic nervous system does not differentiate neatly between surgical recovery and interpersonal threat. Emotional activation is physiological activation. The body mobilises. Vessels constrict. Heart rate shifts. Pressure rises.

It was a live demonstration of what I teach daily: the brain interprets context, and the body follows.

Post-surgery healing is not occurring in isolation from relationships, history, or unresolved stressors. The nervous system carries all of it.

It reinforced something important — protecting recovery also means protecting psychological boundaries.  The spine may have been decompressed.  The nervous system still responds to perceived threat.

And the body keeps score — in real time.

Impatience: The Broad Bean Experiment

I’ll admit something.

I’m slightly annoyed with myself for letting this go on as long as I did — focusing on other life demands instead of addressing the neurological progression earlier.

Ironically, I would advise my own clients differently.

And then there’s my impatience.

When I was ten, we were given a broad bean to grow for a science experiment. Measure it. Water it. Observe it.