One vote each way! Thanks to both of you

I know in the end it's my decision to make, but I wish it was easier to do internet research. Most people who post on the web about back pain are somewhat hysterical.

I know that the screws tweak nerves on occasion, and not usually in a way that I can replicate. They can test to see if removal will help this by injecting lidocaine around the screws to see if that eases pain. So there's a preliminary option.

The other thing that slightly bothers me is just that I can feel them all the time. Not painfully, necessarily, but I won't sit in wooden or plastic-backed chairs any more. I can't "roll through" my back (like, say, Rolling Like a Ball in pilates). Just imagine leaning against a chair with a small pebble on either side of your spine at your bra line and two more about 3ish inches lower. Worth surgery? Probably not. But years of this?? Hard to project whether it's worth it.

Too bad the spine isn't an area to gain fat first if I just overdosed on the Christmas cookies!

(Oh, and Kiwi - they don't set off metal detectors for me, but they're close enough to the skin that they occasionally show up as a "problem" with the x-ray scanners...and since I'm at close to 80 flights for this year, it's annoying )