Re-Post: What are Your Favorite Anecdotes for Chronic Pain?

Hi George’s wife, I wanted to mention anti-anxiety medication’s for your husband. I have witnessed instances of giving patients diazepam (Valium) or Ativan when painting intensifies as a caregiver. I had my own experience once in the hospital when they replaced my hip and I had incredible pain. I think it was in my knee. they refused to give me more opioid. It wasn’t that much opioid. I was on one of those machines where you push the button and I think they had just taken me off of it, I had a meltdown. I asked them to bring me a phone and I called the doctor and swore at him because I was in such incredible pain. ( The hospital told me that would only give me more pain medicine if the doctor approved; so I told them to bring me a phone and I called the doctor!) the doctor didn’t like that so much so then the head nurse of the hospital came to see me and prescribed me a very low dose of Valium. immediately it controlled the pain! I was very comfortable after that. it was a wonderfully kept secret. I don’t know why they hide things like that. I was probably more out of control with anxiety and suffering and by getting control of the anxiety I could control the pain.. I hope that idea might help your husband. I also witnessed it when both my mother and my father were in hospice and their pain levels caused them to suffer terribly. Controlling suffering with anti-anxiety medicine really helped.
Pain is a difficult thing under any circumstance, and chronic pain really destroys the quality of any life. All the things that you spoke about the empathy, the gratitude, awe, et al, those help me with my emotional pain. They are wonderful tactics I use when down in the dumpster, but it does not seem to phase my chronic pain.
I can’t remember who recommended the books about mind over matter with Dr. Sarno (and his follow up) but the problem for me is that I can’t do anything else while I’m focusing on mind over matter to get rid of my pain. So I really appreciate the opioid which does the same thing, but allows me to function while it removes the pain. I was talking about this with my doctor yesterday about how the pain felt in my brain it is relatively real, I have isolated the pain mostlyto my nerves, nerve sheaths, and my muscle fascia sheaths. They seem to be the network which transports the sensation of pain from the area which is aggravated, to my brain. The opioid interrupts the pain signal in my brain.
There is some pain for which this would not be a good idea. Pain is there to send us a message to change something. It needs to be heard and it needs to be acted on. However, there is some pain for which the medical industry provides no assistance and which just needs to be quieted.
I am grateful that I have a happy medium. You asked about antidotes: anything creative takes my mind away from where I don’t wanna be. working on my ancestry, cooking, painting, taking a slow walk, reading a good book not just a good book — an engaging book – anything that is so incredibly absorbing that I am 100% engaged. Maybe you could sit down and make yourself a list. Kind of like a bucket list, but not things you wanna do before you die things that are so engaging that you lose track of time and reality. I also love heat. I love my heating pad I love my little sauna. I love to kick the thermostat up and wrap myself in blankets with my dog (who absolutely hates being warm, lol). I love shiny objects or lights. I could sit and stare at the Christmas tree all night long. I can put on my favorite music mix and shut my eyes and get rid of my body.
I believe we are spiritual beings having a physical experience. If you can focus on being light like air and remove your head, your consciousness, or your awareness from your body, you may be able to interrupt the pain signals.. If you can focus on being light like air and remove your head or your consciousness or your awareness from your body, you may be able to interrupt the pain signals. Sounds like you may wish to do this without medicine. For me, I have no desire to suffer and I just want the pain signals to be gone without doing any damage to my body. medicine works just fine along with my doctors support.
Take care George’s wife, and get rest when you can. I find that pain is exacerbated when I am not well rested. Maybe you need a caregiver as well. If you use the next-door app and you are very careful, you can find some nice people that will come to friend you and give you a little respite. I see people helping each other all the time there! Good luck

Thank you George’s wife and loriesco….Your comments are inspiring and oh so true.

I feel I should offer one caveat. I too found great comfort and the ability to function with opioids. However, after relying on them for about two years, with the need to titrate upwards, I have found the digestion issues overwhelming. Already blessed with IBS and GERD, I can no longer tolerate the daily stomach cramps. Knowing what to eat and when is impossible to predict. So, with my doctor’s support, I am weaning off the oxycodone. When I am off it completely I’m hoping the doctor (PCP) and I can find a substitute that doesn’t have the digestive side effects. Tylenol and NSAIDs barely touch the pain.

In my case it’s lower back pain. Next week I’m having the M.I.L.D. procedure for stenosis. In the future I plan to try radio frequency ablation (RFA) for the arthritic pain.

@jackiet

Sorry you have so much discomfort, and best of luck with your upcoming procedure.

Since you are exploring RFA, have you read the posts by others who have tried that? Some people don't experience much relief with that while others do. It didn't work for my husband, who suffers from lower back pain even after two spinal fusion surgeries. (He can't take oral opiods, so he uses pain strips that I place under his tongue. He also tried prescription pain medication administered through patches but he didn't like the patches.)

Sendidng you prayers,
'George's Wife

@loriesco

Thank you for your response and encouragement.

George's Wife

P.S. anniesezu812 (@anniesezu812) mentioned Sarno and Shubiner.

@jackiet you should have no digestive problems with the opioids themselves. What I think might be your problem is the lactose in the pills. Are you lactose intolerant by any chance? People forget to check the ingredients of their medicine. The white pill oxycodone gives me a stomach ache, which is rectified by taking a Lactaid pill. Everyone thinks that cheap medicines are so great. I just find that cheap medicines bring a lot of ingredients that we can’t tolerate in our older age one of them being lactose the other being gluten. There’s a white pill oxycodone a pink pill oxycodone (I tolerate those very well) and there is the Percocet, which I mainly have used for 25 years and have no digestive problems. Sometimes when the pharmacies change brands, it causes a problem and I always find that the problem is in the ingredients which are overlooked by the cheap proliferation of medicine these days. I hope that helps you PS you could also have a condition called SIBO small intestinal bacterial overgrowth, which requires a targeted antibiotic called Xifaxan. Periodically I have to take that and then I can go back to being a somewhat normal person and just taking the Lactaid pills. I hope that helps you.

@jackiet I had great results with RFA! What it resolved for me was the referred pain that was caused by the stenosis. I couldn’t sleep at night and my thighs would just ache nonstop and it stopped that pain for 15 years. I don’t think it resolves lower back pain so much as it does wonders on referred pain. Also one should know there are two types: one type is called heat and the other is called pulse. The pulse did nothing for me. Only the heat works for me. Be sure to discuss that with your doctor.

@loriesco

Thanks for telling us about the difference between heat and pulse RFA. George's physical medicine/pain management group never gave us that information.

George's wife

@loriesco Around two months ago I switched from taking hydrocodone with acetaminophen to oxycontin (I understand that's pure oxycodone) Controlled Release, along with some Percocet (the combination of oxycodone with acetaminophen). Correct me if I'm wrong about these distinctions, because I can't follow your pink and white pill references. The oxycontin 15 mg was grey and the oxycontin 10 mg is white. The other pills were always white. When I made this switched to the controlled release (CR or ER) is when I think I started having worse stomach problems.

I had thought that was a good idea because the oxycontin was controlled release and would get me through 12 hours instead of 6, and I couldn't get hydrocodone controlled release because it wasn't being manufactured at the time.

I am lactose intolerant and often gluten intolerant as well. Based on your suggestion I am going to immediately make the switch to taking Percocet twice a day to see if that makes a difference. If it does I'm throwing away the damn oxycontin.

Thank you so much for your input. You would think my doctor could have clued me in.......

@loriesco Thank you. Yes, I am aware of the two ways of deadening the nerve. I have also heard of Intrasept ablation, which seems superior to the old RFA procedures. I do plan to ask my pain management person about all of this when the time comes. Thankfully I believe I have a good person to perform these procedures. He did his residency at Yale and then an additional fellowship in anesthesiology (and whatever) at Cleveland Clinic, which I'm told is useful for doctors who do these minimally invasive procedures.

Appreciate your help.

@jackiet make sure you’ve seen an orthopedic surgeon for your lumbar spine. They take a simple x-ray and a good orthopedic surgeon will tell you if your discs are falling out of place. I had an amazingly successful lumbar surgery with all the bells and whistles. Unfortunately, everybody waited too long to get me to the orthopedic surgeon. After 20 years, my discs fell completely out, the bones grafted together and it squished the life out of the exiting nerve roots so they couldn’t regenerate after surgery. People put an Oogie boogie on surgery, but if they wait too long and they don’t have a good orthopedic surgeon they may not be able to fully heal.