Proprioception and the Wonky Walking

Now that most of the swelling has gone down, we seem to have a handle on what symptoms were swelling related (the constant pins and needles firing in my legs) and what is actual damage related.

proprioception   pro·pri·o·cep·tion (prō'prē-ō-sěp'shən) n.
The unconscious perception of movement and spatial orientation arising from stimuli within the body itself.

Of which I have none in my right leg.  Starting from the hip, over to the mid-line, all the way down to my foot, front and back. Just like a petulant child, my stimuli from within my right leg are giving my brain the silent treatment.

Close your eyes and think about how you are sitting right now ... where are your legs and how are they positioned? Are your legs crossed, are they tucked under the chair with your ankles crossed, out in front of you on the couch with one knee bent?  I can't do that. My right leg sends no signals back to my brain to tell me where it is and what it's doing.  To know where my right leg is right now, I have to look. Sitting, standing or lying down I don't know if or how my knee is bent, how my foot is positioned, or where my leg is in relation to my left leg. 

Walking, either with canes or walkers,  means looking at my right leg.  Always. Otherwise I fall down.  My stride is odd because I don't know the bend of my knee. Planting my foot is gawky because I can't align it properly. No feedback from leg to brain, just motor requests from brain to leg.

I am a fan of the google, and have spent some time looking up the loss of unconscious proprioception, and came across an interesting, reasonably respectable website

Brown-Sequard Syndrome is a rare spinal cord condition that is caused by an incomplete lesion to the spinal cord. This damage can be caused by a spinal cord tumor, ischemia (obstruction of a blood vessel), trauma ... or infectious or inflammatory diseases.

A lesion to the fasciculus gracilis or fasciculus cuenus (as pictured below in the top blue section) will result in loss of light touch, vibration sensation and proprioception.

Individuals have a relatively good prognosis. ... More than 90% of affected individuals successfully regain the ability to walk. ... Recovery period is, on average, two years, but it depends on the degree of damage suffered by the individual. (1)

Interestingly, my left leg is suffering from damage to a slightly different area of the spinal cord, and I don't have temperature or pin prick sensation. (Dull pain comes up a different tract than sharp pain). "Unlike injuries of the other tracts, injury to the lateral spinothalamic tract causes contralateral loss of pain and temperature sensation" (2) (Contralateral being the other side of the body ... thus my left side) Proprioception? Check! Therefore walking is no problem.  I just can't check the temperature of the bathwater with that foot. By all accounts, this should heal the same way the other damage heals.

I know you can find anything you want on google, but I'm thinking this article suits my positive attitude.




(1) www.macalester.edu
(2) http://emedicine.medscape.com/article/793582