I wish a pain management specialist was that easy my husband has been on a waiting list for pain management for over three years by then I won't need help... so I guess if the one thing I wish I would have known about this surgery is to make sure you are covered during recovery rather than go into it thinking you will be taken care of only to be abandoned because a doctor doesn't think that you are or should be in pain. Every one is different and when I went to the pre surgery appointment they assured me that I would be ok. That on a scale of 1-10 I shouldn't let it get higher than a 5 or 6 before taking something. Weather you should be in pain or not is irreguardless everyone has different pain tolerances and heal at different rates. It's not that I am a stranger to pain live with it most of my life between chronic back pain (disintegrating disks) fibromyalgia, arthritus just kinda the tip there have been others...They didn't care about that so why should they care now...