Happenings

Well the pills are helping a little bit, but not cutting it, and I did make it back to work yesterday rather than have a mountain of work pile up. But I did talk to my boss today to tell him I’m not really coping, between the pain, the zombie effect of the tablets and the stress of trying to get my Physics up to scratch and get notes for a course I’ve no real experience of, it’s doing me in! So he’s gonna put out feelers and see what he can do. I have tomorrow off anyway and another doctor’s appointment. So will try get something together for Thurs, I’m not gonna leave him in the lurch with no teacher if I can help it, they’ve been very decent to me so far.

I am going to spend some time on my jewellery tomorrow though, because it looks like it’s going to be what we’re living on shortly enough! Fingers crossed it takes off people!

Herbalists, Life Coaches and Laughter Yoga.

The pain has been pretty fricking bad this weekend, and I’m at the end of my tether! Went to the first of my classes in Herbal Medicine yesterday which was pretty good and he suggested Celery seeds too. I then walked/stood around town for about an hour, max 2 hours and I came home on the verge of tears and lay down with my hot water bottle on the floor. I had an early night, read a book for a while and slept through 13 hours! These new tablets have me wrecked! Got up today went to the Cardiff natural health show which was just 5 min walk away in the search for more ideas. Went to 3 workshops, unfortunately had missed the most of the morning, the life coach Julie Britton was very good, although her reviews on youtube are harsh http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oq-dxz_ohyI but I found the whole thing quite good kinda like a group counselling session. The “Naturopath” was a lot of rubbish, and the laughter yoga was one of the most random things I’ve ever done, I was quite out of my comfort zone with that one! A few interesting stalls, I shall be trying meditation next sat but there was an awful lot of pseudo science that I’m just a little too informed to buy into! And the few healers I talked to didn’t seem to know what to do with someone who has a real definite problem.

I got home planning to lesson plan and attempt to go back  to work tomorrow, but the pain in my neck had taken over again and cue sobbing mess feeling sorry for myself. I’ve somewhat pulled myself together, gotten a little planning done, nowhere near as much as I should but I can’t concentrate on it, so taking a break and hoping it helps, not told work I’m gonna try come in tomorrow cause honestly I don’t know if I’ll be able, so I’ll see how I feel in the morning and try make it in. I feel like if I don’t get back soon, I never will.  

The bunnies are running around the room like absolute loopers!

Gotta be proactive!

Well I’m off sick from work for a few days at the least, hoping the new pain killers kick in, it’s been very hard going lately, hard to concentrate and not able to do any prep when I got home, not really an issue with the GCSE classes, I know the stuff I did the notes up last year they just needed tweeking a little, but the Upper sixth classes have really been rough, I can’t concentrate with the pain and I’m getting confused over stuff I know, and sitting down to write up notes is a nightmare. So I’m off sick, still having to send in cover work though so I’m not sure how much easier it is. I’m not happy to have called in sick, so far in however many years with the pain I’ve never actually missed work because of it, I’ve kinda just muddled on, sure I missed work for docs visits etc but not due to the actual pain. That’s depressing me, cause I don’t think I’ve suddenly become a whimp, I think it means it’s just gotten that much worse.

The doc has put me on new tablets, Amitriptyline, it’s an anti depressant which in small doses works as a painkiller, ...I looked it up to make sure the doc wasn’t fibbing and just thought I needed a pick up. I’m not allowed drink and the main side effect seems to be makes you sleepy, on the plus side I slept like the dead last night on the down side I’m fairly wrecked today. Fingers crossed it wprls, I have another appointment on Wed.

I’ve decided to be as proactive as I can be, so I’m going to do gentle exercise today and tomorrow and I have physio tomorrow gonna dig for ideas and then probably join the gym up the road, which is close enough I have no excuse and has a deal on for 6 weeks so can join and see if I use it, and it has sauna and steam room which I think may do me as much good as the pool. I’m gonna try to eat well as well, I’m wearing copper jewellery, even round the house, drinking my celery seeds and I start a Herbal medicine course in Cardiff Uni on Sat and shall be getting all the advice and suggestions off the teacher I can!

In other news we have a friend from Ireland visiting, Conan is just gone to pick him up, the apt is not as clean as I’d like and that’s really really annoying me! But I’m just not able!

Proactive! I can do it! Need to get the pain under control!

Suggestions welcome!

Well just been to the docs, and I’m coming off one set of tablets to try another, see if this does anything about the pain. It's been getting worse not better and the injections don't seem to have done anything, although apparently could still work. Fingers crossed.

I’m also currently wearing an unsealed copper ring and about to drink some celery seeds, and then prob some flax seeds and if anyone has any other suggestions please send them this way!

Physio this evening so hopefully she’ll make me feel a little better.

Too many drugs

The pain has been pretty bad this week, hence the fact that I have a hot water bottle at my back at the mo. It’s getting me down a fair bit, I know the doc only put me on panadol last week but I swear I’m completely out of it since. I can’t seem to finish a thought and I’m half way through an explanation or a story to a class and I blank. Friday was difficult. Hopefully tomorrow will be better.

Not just in work that I’m out of it, made several really stupid mistakes with my jewellery making tonight, sent stuff flying across the room cut things too small etc, and then had to give up cause my back was too sore. Very very much sick of this! Another doc appointment on Wed, hopefully she’s heard something from my consultant. Tempted to bring my hot water bottle to school tomorrow but would feel a bit like a freak! It’s bad enough that if someone comes into the lab they might spot me lying on the bench and doing my stretches which look like I’m thrusting at the ceiling!  

Tummy not great either, don't think it's liking all the pills I'm feeding it.

Pick me up, shake me, and I'll rattle!

Well so far those shots have not worked, in fact I’ve been sorer this week then I have been in a long time. In all likelihood that has to do with the fact that I’m in work all day, over the summer I could lie down or do my stretches or get my hot water bottle when I was sore. But you can’t exactly tell a class full of kids hang on Miss needs to go lie down for 5 mins on the floor. So I’ve been coming home in a fair bit of pain.

With this in mind I went to the doctor today to ask for help, it wasn’t my normal GP she’s on hols but the one I got was very nice too, she’s given me prescription for 100 paracetamol, 8 a day. I know it’s only panadol, but that brings me up to 11 tablets a day! Not including any vitamins that I think I should probably be trying! Also got a suggestion from someone today (thank you) to try celery seeds, so going to give them a go, and I’m starting to wear unsealed copper, it turns me green but I’m told it will stop doing that and it might help with the pain! I’ll give anything a go at the mo!

Have an appointment for the doc again next wed and she is trying to get in touch with the consultant to see what’s happening there, fingers crossed!

Facet Joint Injections

So last Thursday I had my facet joint injections in my neck, I think its cortisone they injected me with. The idea is to reduce the pain in my joints from inflammation. http://www.royalfree.nhs.uk/pip_admin/docs/facet_joint_injections_111.pdf  .....I didn’t get any sedative!

It hurt like hell, it was really, really, awful I cried like a little girl, and cursed like a sailor and felt like such a fool as they wheeled me back to the ward still sobbing. Especially after I’d seen all these other people say it was a little sore when they arrived back on the ward before it was my turn. Felt a little better when I saw the other woman who was having her neck done, she was just as bad. Apparently your neck is the most painful place, so I think they purposely left us till the end so as not to scare anyone else! I was told not to shower for 48 hours, to which I replied “but I’ve work tomorrow” and the doc said “eh no you don’t”. So I had to ring my new boss and get off Friday, mostly due to the risk that I could just black out at any stage for the next 48hours. All Friday I was fairly out of it and sore and battered so just as well wasn’t working.

By Saturday I felt like someone had taken a baseball bat to my neck and pounded as hard as they could. But on Saturday afternoon I noticed the normal pain was gone. The relief was amazing, so strange to not hurt that I broke down crying (it seems to be my thing at the moment). An hour or so later the pain came back and it’s been there since, Today is a particularly bad day, I always have good and bad days, I’m on the verge of tears (again) and I just don’t know what to do, I’m going to go have a bath and hope the water helps, I need these injections to work, they still could, I need it! I’m so worn out!

My story so far

I’m a 28 year old with osteoarthritis and I’m starting up this blog to discuss my condition and how I deal with chronic pain. Hopefully this will help me deal and get all my problems out and hopefully if there is anyone else out there fighting to figure out what’s wrong, or trying to deal with chronic pain, maybe I can help them a little and maybe they can help me some.  

Right so, lets start from the start, I hear its a very good place to start....

In 2006 I moved to South Korea for a year TEFL teaching I’d just finished college and I didn’t really know what to be doing with myself. Pretty soon after I arrived my back pain that had been steadily getting worse over the last few years of college got much much worse. I put it down to a rubbish bed and sitting on the floor all the time, fortunately my Dad had taken out a good health insurance policy for me and I was covered to go to a Chiropractor, so I did that for the year I was there. He told me my posture was awful and that I needed to stand up straight, he would make the pain go away for a day or two sometimes and make it worse other times, but it never helped for very long.

I only stayed there for a year, and when I got back to Ireland, I hoped with a decent bed (I had been sleeping on 3 mattresses on top of each other) and sitting in chairs that it would get better, it didn’t. So I tried another Chiropractor, he made matters worse, he had a strange bed that the middle would fall out of and jolt your back and my entire lower back ended up swollen! He suggested ice packs and I would have them strapped to me in work; at the time I was working in a cinema so on my feet a lot, and sweeping and cleaning so relatively manual work. I didn’t go back to him and at this stage given how long this had been going on I decided to go to my GP, he found some tenderness and sent me for X-ray and blood test, both of which showed nothing, he suggested an acupuncturist, again put it down to stress and posture, telling me to sit/stand up straight, not listening when I told them that was physically painful and exhausting.

I had some success with acupuncture; well with the second person I tried, I also had cupping and massage and by back was disgusting looking for weeks, I was given all sorts of tiny pills and heat was recommended this time, so cold packs were replaced with hot packs. It did get a little better, but it was expensive, I finished the course recommended, and the effects lasted about 6 months by which time I had moved up to Dublin and I couldn’t afford to go back, especially if it wasn’t going to last.

The issue got worse again, I tried Physio, he hooked me up to some machines walked away and charged me €60 or so for the privilege. I had a physical therapist suggested to me, so I tried him, again with the stress and the posture and what was supposed to be a few visits turning into once a week or fortnight for about 6 months, until I pretty much ran out of money again and realised that I left him feeling good but by the time I got home I was in bits again, the exercises he gave me helped a little but not hugely. He did mention I had flat feet but only in passing. At the time I was working in an office with a well paying job, sound boss, nice people and they did everything they could to help, I got a decent chair and back rests, a head set for the phone, I was allowed to just get up and walk around. Even still over the 10 months or so I was there I spent hours in the bathroom crying my eyes out from the pain. I had Tiger balm, bio freeze ibuprofen etc, you named it I tried it but No luck. I decided I couldn’t do an office job, and I hate that my back decided that for me, don’t get me wrong I don’t particularly like office life, the lights, the air conditioning, etc but it sucks to not have the option.  

In August 2009 I moved to North Wales with my boyfriend, I started a teacher training course, within a week I was in hospital after he tickled me (seriously) and I put my back out! Difene tablets for a week or so, I could hardly move. I got myself a new GP and I went to her about it, at this stage I had been trying to do something for about 4 years to no avail, she told me “what do you expect me to do that your last doctor couldn’t?” fantastic bloody attitude. I tried an osteopath, she was lovely she tried but then told me there was nothing she could do for me. I had a year of hot water bottles and baths, coming home from school and having to lie down for an hour because it hurt too much to do anything.

I went back to Ireland for a few weeks the next summer and put my back out again, could barely get out of bed, difene again. I tried a physio that specialises in feet and she gave me insoles for my shoes said that I was very flat footed and my pelvis rolled inwards, maybe this was the cause of the pain. I could only fit the insoles in 2 pairs of shoes both too casual for work, so they got worn sometimes but not for long, I tried shoe shopping and would just get frustrated. When I came back to Wales we moved to Cardiff, things were getting really bad at this stage, I couldn’t go to a film in the cinema without being in serious pain by halfway through, I was bailing on nights out, I went to friends houses with my hot water bottle in hand.

Finally I lucked out! My new GP (Dr Morgan) is amazing! NHS rules meant she had to send me for an X-Ray and blood tests again, they came back fine and I got put on an MRI waiting list. The MRI finally showed something up. I have osteophytes in my neck, from what I can gather this is tiny little spurs of extra bone and they are pressing on my nerves, hence the pain. I also have a disc bulging in my lower back, which causes some pain but more of a dull constant rather than the sharp pain from my neck. The NHS has been amazing, I’ve gotten physio, I go once every 2 weeks or so, I’ve gotten good painkillers, pick me up, shake and I rattle, I’ve gotten insoles made from the podiatrist and these ones actually fit in some shoes, and I’ve just had facet joint injections in my neck which will hopefully help. Although wow it hurt!

I’m still having to deal obviously, I have a hot water bottle at my back as I type and my computer is all set up in a way that allows me to sit here, and I just can’t hold any one position for very long. But I know I’m not crazy! When I found out in March what was wrong, I was relieved! To know that I wasn’t just moaning was such a relief, to be actually able to say this is the problem, now how do I deal with it. Of course I was bummed to find out there was no easy answer and that I’m stuck with it for life. There is lots of things I still don’t know, I’m on a million waiting lists for doctors and physios and I have lots of questions, but I’m not crazy and I’m sticking to that! That’s my silver lining!