Chronic Pain members - Welcome, please introduce yourself

Hi Everyone,

I’m from the Midwest & I’ve been struggling with pain for about 25 years.

I’ve got rheumatoid arthritis & severe back issues as well as several unrelated diseases.

I’ve had 3 back surgeries, knee replacement, open lung surgery.

I’ve got a spinal cord stimulator & I’m on pain medicine & Pregabalin. I get injections regularly.

I am searching for relief & hoping to find friends who have had similar issues that I can learn from & connect with.

Thank you. 😊

There are neurologist that specialize in headaches. Might have to go to a larger regional facility or a university hospital. For some patients, Botox is a miracle, if muscle spasm is playing a role.

There are also newer drugs (ubrogepant, rimegepant) but I imagine they are expensive

Oxygen therapy helps cluster headaches

Have you tried any of these?

I do the regimen suggested by dr Forrest Tenant, an arachnoiditis expert. I also follow his diet which is essentially an anti inflammatory diet.

I recently invested in a reclining sofa. I am able to sit in it for over an hour. It allows to to socialize and remain comfortable. I’m trying to enlarge my support network.

I, too, am following an anti-inflammatory food regimen. No processed foods here--no alcohol. No added sugars (except on Saturday or Sunday). I will have to look in to reclining sofa styles. For now, I take breaks from sitting for too long. Part of my pain is due to a pulled glute muscle. I did go to physical therapy yesterday, and unlike other times, I had a more positive experience. I have had the pulled muscle since June--I am told it can take a long time to heal. I may try Naproxyn-an NSAID specified for muscles. Today I did some shopping and know I must strengthen to keep going. A support network is surely valuable--there are days when I feel truly alone and isolated. Still, I have Patty, my wonderful dog.

Good afternoon. My name is David. My wife Melinda and I live in Plano Texas . I am seventy three years old. I was born in the Mississippi delta during the civil rights movement . The name of my town is Greenville. Contrary to the stereotypical view of Mississippi it was an extraordinary place to grow up. When I left graduate school I moved to Texas because my mother was in Dallas. I have been in Texas since that time. I am a retired clinical psychologist. I am Jewish as is my wife Melinda . I am deeply involved in my faith and have been for some time. Were it not for my Judaism and my relationship with the Torah and Hashem, I would not be here. My chronic pain history revolves around trigeminal pain. For the last twelve years I have suffered from severe ,continuous bilateral Facial Pain. It was initially misdiagnosed and therefore mistreated as trigeminal neuralgia . During that time , I received countless injections and three nerve stimulator implant surgeries , all of which failed. Neuro modulation was simply not a sustainable solution for me. So eventually I had to graduate from the world of pain doctors to the world of neuosurgeons. That was about three years ago. It is incredibly hard to find a neurosurgeon with facial pain experience, but I did. He has performed two surgeries on me. The first.
was a high cervical spinal cord surgery and the second was an occipital surgery. Both of these are nerve stimulator surgeries. Despite my history with them , I let him do them because he is so highly regarded as a national expert in facial pain. They both failed to reduce my pain. I have no other viable treatment options now apart from exploring ketamine infusions. This pain has hijacked my life and forced me to live the vast majority of the last twelve years in my home. I have somehow found the strength, the resilience and the fluidity to survive this remarkable adaptation. Only through Hashems grace of course. By the way,the word Hashem means the name in Hebrew. I am sorry to lapse into Hebrew. It has become an unconscious habit. So now you have the basic elements of my chronic pain history. I welcome your
comments and any help and insight you can give me would be greatly appreciated. Thank you for listening.

Good morning. Can the chronic pain
Discussion members see my post below . Should we move the post to the chronic pain discussion? It's so can you do that for me?

Hi Everybody,

I live in the Midwest although I hail from the West Coast. Nine years ago I suffered a back injury that resulted in lumbar spinal stenosis. My symptoms were initially very mild but progressive, but I do not have back pain. All of my issues are below the knee. Pain and numbness in the toes and bottoms of the feet, always worse on the left (where the sciatica originated) are my mainstays, and always worse at night.

I have seen three neurologists for the condition, the last at Stanford, and have been told by two that I don’t need surgery, the condition can be managed. Up until just three months ago, I relied on physical therapy to relieve most of the worst effects but recently started a low dose of gabapentin because the pain has migrated to my shins, and is quite painful at night.

I feel a little guilty joining this forum as I am quite ambulatory, although I don’t hike anymore and certainly don’t backpack (!), one of my longtime pre-back-injury-goals for after I retired. Instead, any exertion these days exacerbates my pain, so I no longer ‘push it’ with long walks or bike rides, or even car trips of longer than an hour.

I’m hoping to find others in similar straits who may have had some non-surgical luck in alleviating the condition. I’m a busy guy, or at least I was. I’d surely like to be again.

My current physician has suggested an epidural, but I don’t know. Maybe someone here can describe their experience with these.

I, like you, wish to pursue a non-surgical route. And, like you, I am able to walk alot--and have no pain in doing such. I have lower spinal issues relating to a faulty experience with PT where they placed ankle weights on me. I am now at a new PT place and I do get some relief with exercise and stimulation. I will begin acupuncture treatment this Monday and am really hoping that it will work. I am very careful of foods--I need to be gluten-free and I only have desserts like ice cream or cookies on the weekend. The doctor told me not to lift more than five lbs. and gave me a list of vitamin supplements to use. Sitting too long for me is the worst. I am also planning to order a cushion to ease sitting posture. I, too, have passed on the epidural for now. Mindset plays an important part, so your desire to be "busy" again may help you pursue remedies.

Hi All,
I'm in Australia, I'm now 65, hurt my back age 20 as a nurse, once I got over the initial issues, it only seemed to bother me now and again. More recently (last couple of years) it has developed into Rheumatoid /osteo arthritis/degenerative discs, several falls didn't help either. I'm on meds for rheumatoid but seem to be developing issues (side effects) takes so long to get in to see a doc that I sort that out myself by taking myself off them). It's a battle nowadays, the mind says get up and do what needs doing, the body says if you do I will make u suffer, (and it does). I have spent decades caring for various family members all gone now except one.

@hashemis1 That seems like a good idea.