Christmas , over at last

Thank you Chuck.I do have a book of tests.mri,mylegrams,ct scans.And still no doctor helps me.How close is williamsburg to Belfry .I am so glad that you are getting some help.If you think of anyone my area please do tell. Libby

Hi, No i am getting tramadol 4 times a day.When i get in such pain,It runs my BP out of the roof.I have taken the injections,they didnt help.They actually wanted to put the rod and cage around my spine at one point ,BUT comp wouldnt appraov eit?I am so tired.What is most helpful to you?

Hello again Libby

 

I have an assortment of treatments that I go through daily & some monthly.

I've found that pacing my every activity has proven to be more effective then just tryijng to push through the pain and end up not able to get up for a few days to pay for my forcing myself to rut on through.

I use a digital heating pad on about 95-125 defrees every morning for at least an hour I will do some stretching of my spine, arms, legs, ect all the while I'm trying to get the stiffness and pain to come down.  Of course I take my morning dose of sustained release meds as soon as I get up and then creep, limp & crawl out to my recliner in hopes the meds & heat will take effect soon.

I also take a bath in 1 cup Epson saltz, 1/2 cup baking soda and about 3-4 scoops of Village Naturals bath soak saltz.  http://www.thevillagecompany.com/therapybathsoak.html  Every day and soak.  I've found this mixture to really be effective at relieving a great deal of pain and the village naturals soaks with the shower gels that match the saltz soaks have a linament effect of your muscles that stays with you for a good hour or two after you get out of the tub.  The village company also sells a lotion for Aches & Pain & another for Headache relief that I use both of them too.  The company has really treated me very well for being a customer and the manager will contact you if you have any questions or concerns about their products.  They are very affordable too, about 3 to 6$ per product and that's pretty good, especially when I tried about 50 different saltz mixes that did not work nearly as good and were much more expensive.  Bath saltz have natural healing properties in them and they say they pull the toxins out of you too?  I don't know about all that, I just know that the baths & lotions have really helped me to cope with pain and add a positive home treatment option to my pain tool box.

 

I also do a series of stretching exercises through out the day and when the weather permits I take my dog (as a distraction) down to our local country schools walking path they made last year and my husband measured it off for me and each lap is just a little over a 1/2 mile and depending on the pain, I normally make two laps and work with training my puppy, as he distracts my mind enough to try to ignore some of the pain.  I'm of course in bad pain by the time I get back to the car, but I them come home and take something for the Breakthrough pain and sit in my reclienr with my heating pad for an hour or how ever long it takes to ease the pain.

 

I have a message every 3 weeks or so and my therapist uses all different types of techniques on me so we can figure out what works best.

 

I've changed my diet quite a bit.  We eat alot of raw veggies or lightly steamed ones, fresh fruit and we don't eat hardly any red meat. I eat more grains & cereals daily, added more water with fresh lemon slices in it daily, it's supposed to alkaline your system and be helpful to your muscles?  I also have found some supplements for FM & Chronic pain to take.  I take two doses a day of Fibro-response, two doses of Samm-e 200, and 200 mg of 5-HTP daily.

http://vitanetonline.com/description/SN1217/vitamins/Fibro-Response/

 

http://www.5htp.com/

 

http://www.harvesthealth.com/samfulpot1.html

 

I buy mine from Vitacost.com for a much more reasonalbe price than a couple of these have listed on the sites I added, they seem to have really good deals and ship them to you very quickly.

I don't recomend anyone take or try any supplements with out first taking the bottles in to your physician or pharmacist and have them check them out properly to see if you could have any interaction with the meds your already taking.  ****Very Important**** Not checking could be harmful for your health.  I bought mine, then walking into my pharmacy and the pharmacist was very kind to help me and she looked up every ingrediant with every thing I take and then she cleared them for my use.

 

I would try chiropractic, but I have two fractured disk in my lumbar spine that already cause me a tremendous amount of pain & trouble, so I don't want anyone moving anything, and my primary care told me that I would not be able to find a chiroprator that would be even willing to touch me anyway.  I have Radio Frequency Oblation procedures done on my Lumbar spine every few months and they normally give me some relief for a few months.  My lumbar area gets so painful that I'm barely able to walk back to my bedroom and it's a chore to get to the bathroom from my chair and the procedure makes it possible for me to walk.

 

I think that goes over my main treatments that I use, I also use ice packs at times when I'm awaiting a procedure to be done to try and relieve some of the severe pain I have in my lower & part of my upper spine.

 

I hope this helps

What treatments do you use to get through your bad pain?

 

Betty

Thank you for the words of <i know what your going through>.I do not understand why i am not being treated.I guess thats why i get so down.I have been on treatments that helped and now i cannot find a doctor to take my 10 yr injury case.Well we did make it through the hilidays!God bless.Tell me more about this pump?

I know how difficult it is trying to get doctors to listen to you.  I was lucky that I have a great PCP who listens to me and knows that I worked as a litigation paralegal for a personal injury firm, so I pretty much had the pulse of what works and what doesn't.

The pump is called an interthecal pain pump.  The way it works is it is implanted into the side of my waist area and a delivery line is ran around my waist to my spine where a IV delivery system is placed into my spinal cord.  The pump is computerized and delivers a constant amount of pain medication into my spinal cord.  The medication is a coctail of drugs determined by my doctor.  My doctor felt comfortable referring me for the pump because I've been on heavy narcotics for 7 years and they just are not working at all.

It definitely is making a difference in the amount of pain I'm in.  I used to be in so much pain, I couldn't get up or move around, I haven't slept a night through in over 6 years due to pain, basically my life is controlled by the pain.  I am hoping with this pump, I will at least be able to take a walk on the beach with my husband again.

Finding a doctor to perform the procedure is the difficult part, but then finding the right doctor is a fiasco in itself.  If you can't find a doctor to help you, you may want to try to look outside your area.  Good luck, I hope this was of some help.