How our symptoms change?

[become]

Well, since you ask, Mark (nice site, btw).

I haven't been around at all because I had 4 completely pain-free months through the fall--and active, too, hiking 7-8 hours in the mountains almost every weekend. Going to films without being concerned about what would happen, etc. All stuff that I never imagined, or even hoped, to be able to do again.

Whether that was because of the injection I had a year ago or the huge quantities of supplements I started taking when that seemed a clear failure, or just time, I don't know.

Anyway, I felt so good I decided to take up Tai Chi to work on flexibility, which also felt very good--for about about a month. Then disaster hit. So now I'm back researching new developments. And being down again is a lot harder emotionally after having the chance to remind myself what life could, and should, be like...

If there's a 'moral' to this story, it would be that you shouldn't fool yourself into thinking that your back is normal, even if you feel great.

[Maria]

Yesterday I was semi sitting quite a bit to try and work on CEU's for RN,NP license as I keep it active even if it's been 7 years since I worked. Am hoping surgery would allow me to return to work.

Anyway, back to symtpoms, sat too much and today I'm in agonizing pain walking the dog~ tailbone pain is really bad, as is low back. Have bunches of errands to run so will take my usual dose of Methadone and hope for the best.

Perhaps my withdrawl pain is creeping up or popping in on me~ whatever it is, it's what has had me convinced that my back isn't truly better but just in a short type of remission for whatever reason.

Maybe so I got to enjoy life a bit before biting the bullet...

[Hucky :)]

I too have been in remission. I noticed last August that sometimes, I had missed my dose of Neurontin, sometimes by up to 4 hours. I then decided to try going off the drug altogether, so, in a six week period, I titrated myself off completely.

Like Maria, I do flare up, which is very much activity oriented, BUT, I seem to recover a lot more quickly than I ever did before.

It is Summer here in Australia and my nerve pain always was better in the Summer, so I'm holding my breath and hoping that I won't have to go back on it for Winter.

I haven't had a recent MRI, but I can only presume that the C6/7 nerve root is not being compressed anymore.

Unfortunately, I seem to be having more problems with my L5/S1 than I did before. Nothing too debilitating, just frustrating. The pain level doesn't even come near to what I experienced with my C6/7. I find that taking Neurofen plus seems to help with this.

It is odd the way pain ebbs and flows.

Hucky

[mmglobal]

Originally Posted by become

If there's a 'moral' to this story, it would be that you shouldn't fool yourself into thinking that your back is normal, even if you feel great.

Nicely said, Bruce... Thanks for joining us.

While some people experience periods of living normal lives, for many of us, remission means that we live in less pain that we used to experience. Some activities that used to be taboo are now OK. But what I frequently see (and have experienced personally, when we talk about being 'normal' again, we are still mostly disabled. We still limit our activites severely. We still live in fear of that movement, slip, lift, turn or whatever is going to put is back into spinal hell. We know it's coming.

If you were 80% disabled and you feel better and move to 50% disabled.... that starts to seem a lot like being normal. However, 50% disabled is still substantially disabled. Some patients have made a serious mistake in undergoing a risky surgery because they won't accept minor pain and minor disablity... they think that they can go do the big surgery and just be normal. I've also seen many patient who accept the most unbelievable disability levels, even though they are excellent candidates for surgery.

This is beginning to sound like that 'am I bad enough for surgery' discussion. Enough rambling... Thanks everyone... nice discussion.

Mark

[Maria]

edited as necessary