To keep up with the theme of his posts, here’s Lil’ Monty in front of Taj’s MRI
If you’re a regular reader of The Blog of Taj, you’d know that Mr. Mihelich has been having some horrible back problems lately. After a series of doctor visits and a bad-news bearing MRI, it’s been concluded that drills and screws are in store for Taj’s spine.
So, we settled on the fusion surgery. Its what Ruben was describing last post. The crazy part is they go in through the front of your abdomen to do the surgery. Its a relatively small incision, but two surgeons are present. One to do the actual screw and plate and bone graft surgery, and one to monitor and control the extremely vital arteries that run right in front of the spine. Basically they screw and plate the vertebrae together so they can’t move, and then fill the area where the disc used to be with bone grafts that will fill it in so the damaged disc can no longer put pressure on the spine. I think…. I’ll get more and more precise with exactly what is going on as I learn more.
YIKES! The procedure’s going to take him off the bike for 6 months, which is roughly 6 years in BMX time (it goes by much slower when you can’t ride). Needless to say, Taj is really bummed out about the news. Since we haven’t developed a time machine yet to fast-forward 6 months, why don’t we start a thread going full of ideas to pass the time while he’s injured? Aside from YouTube, Twitter and Facebook, what do you do when you can’t ride? With Taj’s personality in mind, recommend some books, movies and low-impact activities you think he might like. Leave it in the comments.
Also, I remember him running a zine distribution outlet a while ago so if you’re running a good ol’ fashion print-zine and have a copy to spare, send it over to Odyssey and we’ll make sure it gets to him. Address is after the jump.
ATTN: Taj, Roscoe and Little Monty
C/O Odyssey BMX
16325 Arthur St.
Cerritos, CA 90703
USA
